Why JavaScript?

I’ve learned a few different programming languages (C, C++, Java, C#, etc.) since I started coding more than 15 years ago, but in the past few years JavaScript is the one that I keep going back to. Here is why:

• Learn once, use everywhere — I can write all of the types of apps that I care about with it (command line apps, backends, interactive website frontends, phone apps, and more)
• Write once, use everywhere—I can create modules or libraries and share them between the different types of apps with little or no code changes
• Easy to get support — Need help? Chances are in a group of devs somebody will know JS. If not there are lots of resources.
• Built by you, improved by others — If you build something interesting others will adopt it and review it and improve it with you.
• Built by others, you don’t want to touch it — Things like security libraries are things that you generally don’t want to touch unless you are an expert or are just playing around. There are many of them that have been built by experts and reviews by many others.

Some of the above apply to other languages, but I haven’t found any other that provides all of the above with such ease. Of course there are drawbacks like the availability of too many libraries or libraries that just fall off support. More on that later.

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