Building a Web Site For Dummies®, 3rd Edition

Dropping In Java Applets

Java applets run the gamut from the trivial and useless to the fabulous. Many Java applets perform some type of image modification, like the popular Lake applet). Others add rotating banner ads or scrolling ticker-tape-style messages. The really nice thing about Java applets is that, like JavaScript, they run on the visitor’s machine, which reduces the load on your Web server. Some drawbacks, however, are the length of time that they take to download to the visitor and the slight delay on the visitor’s end while Java starts up (if it isn’t already running). Figure 8-4 shows the main Java page for Sun Microsystems (www.java.sun.com), the company that invented the language.

Figure 8-4. The java. sun.com main page is the home for the Java language.

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Major programs are called applications. Your word processor or spreadsheet program, for example, is an application. Although Java is indeed used to write applications, the Java programs that are written for the Web tend to be very small, so they’re known by the diminutive name applet.

Despite the similarity in their names, Java and JavaScript are only vaguely similar, and they work quite differently. ...