What are the difference between scripting language and programming language?
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Basically, all scripting languages are programming languages. The theoretical difference between the two is that scripting languages do not require the compilation step and are rather interpreted. For example, normally, a C program needs to be compiled before running whereas normally, a scripting language like JavaScript or PHP need not be compiled.
Generally, compiled programs run faster than interpreted programs because they are first converted native machine code. Also, compilers read and analyze the code only once, and report the errors collectively that the code might have, but the interpreter will read and analyze the code statements each time it meets them and halts at that very instance if there is some error. In practice, the distinction between the two is getting blurred owing to improved computation capabilities of the modern hardware and advanced coding practices.
Another point to be noted is that while classifying a language as scripting language or programming language, the environment on which it would execute must be taken into consideration. The reason why this is important is that we can design an interpreter for C language and use it as a scripting language, and at the same time, we can design a compiler for JavaScript and use it as a programming language. A live example of this is V8, the JavaScript engine of Google Chrome, which compiles the JavaScript code into machine code, rather than interpreting it.
Some scripting languages traditionally used without an explicit compilation step are JavaScript, PHP, Python, VBScript.
Some programming languages traditionally used with an explicit compilation step are C, C++.
Generally, compiled programs run faster than interpreted programs because they are first converted native machine code. Also, compilers read and analyze the code only once, and report the errors collectively that the code might have, but the interpreter will read and analyze the code statements each time it meets them and halts at that very instance if there is some error. In practice, the distinction between the two is getting blurred owing to improved computation capabilities of the modern hardware and advanced coding practices.
Another point to be noted is that while classifying a language as scripting language or programming language, the environment on which it would execute must be taken into consideration. The reason why this is important is that we can design an interpreter for C language and use it as a scripting language, and at the same time, we can design a compiler for JavaScript and use it as a programming language. A live example of this is V8, the JavaScript engine of Google Chrome, which compiles the JavaScript code into machine code, rather than interpreting it.
Some scripting languages traditionally used without an explicit compilation step are JavaScript, PHP, Python, VBScript.
Some programming languages traditionally used with an explicit compilation step are C, C++.
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