JavaScript is a programming language that allows people to make web pages interactive and manage media files, and jQuery is a JavaScript library that helps people use JavaScript to simplify web tasks. All code written in jQuery is converted to JavaScript internally. jQuery is one of the oldest JavaScript libraries, and 98% of websites use JavaScript as their client-side programming language. In this section, you will learn more about JavaScript and jQuery and how to understand them. Once a person understands jQuery and JavaScript, they can decide how to add these skills to their professional toolkit.
People can use JavaScript and jQuery for many purposes. JavaScript is used on the client side and on the server side. It allows individuals to make web pages interactive and is primarily intended for web applications and web browsers. JavaScript is used to display or hide information with a button, change the color of a button, zoom in or out, play audio and video, display animations, or use a hamburger drop-down menu. It is also used to create browser games, web and mobile applications.
jQuery is not a programming language, but a tool to facilitate JavaScript web development. Individuals can even use any JavaScript editor to write jQuery, such as Notepad, Visual Studio, Eclipse, or Ultra edit. jQuery can be used to develop Ajax-based applications to make code simple and reusable, to simplify traversal of the HTML DOM tree, and to perform animations and support Ajax in web applications. jQuery also helps people create flash animated applications. Using jQuery, people only need to know JavaScript and HTML to create animations. Web designers can use many impressive effects to make their designs more elegant.
When using JavaScript, people only need to follow a few simple steps. Programmers can use JavaScript in a web browser, so it doesn’t need to be downloaded and installed. If the browser supports JavaScript, it will be built into the browser and enabled by default. This automation means that people won’t need to change their browser settings if they don’t want to run JavaScript. Many JavaScript downloads are free, so there is no need to pay for scripts written in JavaScript. It’s important to get JavaScript from sites that offer it for free, rather than just copying scripts from anywhere.
