Preview of Navigator 4.0

Contents:
New Language Features
Dynamic HTML
Other New Features

This appendix offers a glimpse at the new JavaScript functionality coming in Navigator 4.0, which will be part of the Netscape Communicator suite. This tutorial was printed before the first beta release of Navigator 4.0 was available, however, so the details here are somewhat speculative and based on rumor. By the time you read this, beta versions of 4.0 may well be available. If so, perhaps this appendix will serve to pique your interest in downloading it.

New Language Features

Navigator 4.0 will feature JavaScript version 1.2. This new version of the language is slated to support several important new features:

• JavaScript 1.2 may support a switch statement, like that in C and Java.
• The delete operator, which is depricated in JavaScript 1.1, will rise from the grave. In JavaScript 1.2, this operator will actually delete or remove properties of object or top-level variables.
• JavaScript 1.2 will feature true garbage collection rather than the reference counting used by Navigator 3.0.
• JavaScript 1.2 will support regular expressions. This support will presumably be built into the String class.