Who created JavaScript at Netscape in 1995?

Brendan Eich created JavaScript at Netscape in 1995. He designed the language and its original browser engine while working on Netscape Navigator, which needed a way to make webpages more interactive.

Eich joined Netscape in April 1995 and initially intended to bring the Scheme programming language into the browser. Netscape management instead wanted a lightweight language whose syntax would look familiar to Java developers. Eich therefore combined ideas associated with Scheme and Self with a Java-like syntax, producing the first version in roughly ten days.

The language went through two names before its official release. It was first called Mocha, then LiveScript when it appeared in a Navigator beta in September 1995. Netscape and Sun Microsystems announced the JavaScript name in December 1995. Despite the name, JavaScript and Java are separate languages with different designs and histories.

JavaScript was later submitted to Ecma International for standardization. The resulting standardized language is called ECMAScript, while JavaScript remains the familiar name for implementations used in browsers and other runtimes.