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External file format

Although originally created for JavaScript, the

tag can be used to specify any number of

different client-side scripting languages with the

language

attribute indicating the type of code being

used. For example,

language

can be set to

VBScript

to use Internet Explorer’s VBScript (Windows

only).

JavaScript code can be written free form within a

tag, but only if the

src

attribute isn’t speci-

fied; when

src

is specified, the code inside a

tag may not work (depending on the browser).

Example:

<html>

<head>

<title>Title of Page</title>

var i = 0;

</script>

</head>

<body>

</body>

</html>

This example shows both inline JavaScript code and a link to an external JavaScript file. When using the

src

attribute, an external JavaScript file is referenced in the same way as images and style sheets.

By convention, external JavaScript files should have a .js extension, although it is not required by most

browsers (this leaves open the possibility of dynamically generating JavaScript code using JSP, PHP, or

another server-side scripting language).

External file format

External JavaScript files have a very simple format. Essentially, they are just plain text files containing

JavaScript code. No

tags are needed inside of external files, because the

tag ref-

erencing the file is present in the HTML page. This makes external JavaScript files look very similar to

source code files for other programming languages.

For example, consider the following inline code:

<html>

<head>

<title>Title of Page</title>

function sayHi() {

alert(“Hi”);

}