A Brief History of ECMAScript Versions

ECMAScript is a scripting language standardized by Ecma International in ECMA-262 and ISO/IEC 16262. Here's a brief history of ECMAScript versions:

1. ECMAScript 1 (1997): The first version of ECMAScript was released in 1997. It introduced basic features such as variables, loops, conditional statements, functions, and exception handling.
2. ECMAScript 2 (1998): This version made minor changes to ECMAScript 1, including better error handling, stricter rules for parsing, and more detailed definitions for some language constructs.
3. ECMAScript 3 (1999): ECMAScript 3 was a major upgrade, adding support for regular expressions, try/catch statements, and better object handling. It also introduced the JSON data interchange format.
4. ECMAScript 4 (never released): ECMAScript 4 was a proposed version that was never released due to disagreements between browser vendors. It aimed to add new features such as classes, modules, and generators.
5. ECMAScript 5 (2009): This version introduced several new features, including strict mode, JSON improvements, and support for getters and setters. It also added new array functions such as forEach, map, and reduce.
6. ECMAScript 6 (2015): ECMAScript 6, also known as ES6 or ECMAScript 2015, was a major update that added many new features, including let and const declarations, arrow functions, classes, template literals, and destructuring.
7. ECMAScript 7 (2016): ECMAScript 7, also known as ES7 or ECMAScript 2016, added only a few new features, including Array.prototype.includes and the exponentiation operator.
8. ECMAScript 8 (2017): ECMAScript 8, also known as ES8 or ECMAScript 2017, introduced features such as async/await, Object.values/Object.entries, and String padding.
9. ECMAScript 9 (2018): ECMAScript 9, also known as ES9 or ECMAScript 2018, added features such as spread properties, rest properties, and asynchronous iteration.
10. ECMAScript 10 (2019): ECMAScript 10, also known as ES10 or ECMAScript 2019, added features such as Array.prototype.flat and Array.prototype.flatMap, as well as improvements to the existing RegExp and Unicode support.
11. ECMAScript 11 (2020): ECMAScript 11, also known as ES11 or ECMAScript 2020, added only a few new features, including String.prototype.matchAll and Promise.allSettled.
12. ECMAScript 12 (2021): ECMAScript 12, also known as ES12 or ECMAScript 2021, added features such as Logical Assignment Operators, String.prototype.replaceAll, and Promise.any.
13. ECMAScript 13 (2022): ECMAScript 13, also known as ES13 or ECMAScript 2022. This version introduces top-level await, allowing the keyword to be used at the top level of modules; new class elements: public and private instance fields, public and private static fields, private instance methods and accessors, and private static methods and accessors.