Do I need to install javascript on my webserver?

Question

First of all, the server is Windows Server 2012 running IIS.

Now, this is probably a really dumb question, but I can't seem to find an answer.

I'm basically in charge of the webserver at our office and I'm just learning as I go.

Right now I'm only making sites using pure HTML/CSS for internal use but I need to add some additional functionality which would ideally be PHP and Javascript.

I've found an install for PHP which seems easy enough, but do I need to install anything on our webserver in order to use Javascript?

Answer 1

JavaScript, in most cases, is a client-side scripting language. That means the code runs in the browser so there's nothing you need to do on the server to enable that.

The exception would be installing some sort of web server written in Node.js which is possible, but totally not necessary in your case.

Answer 2

JavaScript code in the context of a web page has nothing to do with the server and is executed directly by the browser. Every browsers have their own JavaScript engine (eg Chrome`s V8, IE's Chakra, FireFox's SpiderMonkey). However, it is possible use JavaScript as a server-side language by using a platform such as Node.js , wich is based on V8.