(skript ing lang gwij) (n.) A high-level programming language that is interpreted by another program at runtime rather than compiled by the computer’s processor as other programming languages (such as C and C++) are. Scripting languages, which can be embedded within HTML, commonly are used to add functionality to a Web page, such as different menu styles or graphic displays or to serve dynamic advertisements. These types of languages are client-side scripting languages, affecting the data that the end user sees in a browser window. Other scripting languages are server-side scripting languages that manipulate the data, usually in a database, on the server.
Scripting languages came about largely because of the development of the Internet as a communications tool. JavaScript, ASP, JSP, PHP, Perl, Tcl and Python are examples of scripting languages.
