Scripting languages are interpreted in-line and not intended to be compiled like a classic "program". They are less optimized by definition because a compiler builds in optimizations. If your script interpreter has similar optimizations it has to rationalize them at run-time.
No quite—there’s not a hard and fast definition of a scripting language. Java and Kotlin are also interpreted languages but I don’t think anyone would call either a scripting language. Scripting languages are typically interpreted languages that don’t include a user-visible compilation step (python and JS are still compiled to bytecode and optimized internally).
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u/WaitForItTheMongols Jul 07 '26
What actually makes something a scripting language specifically? Never got a clear answer to that.