Can you create new plug ins/scripts in C++ for Java/HTML/W/e?

[htmlnoobie3344]

I was just wonderin' is there a way to make plug ins for Java/HTML/CSS/XML/w/e? what i mean is can you wrap a certain feature of an API to be used in web desgin? i was just wondering. thank you! if ther is, i'd love to know.....(god, i'm getting into programming again.....not good :-P)

[Synook]

HTML, XML and CSS are descriptive, not programming, languages. JavaScript cannot access data from outside the domain it runs in, and therefore cannot access external APIs. However, all server-side languages are definitely advanced enough for you to be able to write a class, function, library or other structure that interacts with a certain API and wraps its functionality. I wouldn't call a resultant script a "plug-in", though.

[boen_robot]

You could actually write a plug-in, but it will either have to be a fast browser specific plug-in (e.g. an ActiveX control for IE, Firefox extension, etc.) or a slow cross browser plug-in (e.g. Flash, as it appears in non IE browsers).Writing plug-ins is not exactly easy, but if you're up for a challenge, knock yourself out. Keep in mind that when we talk about an API for the web, you should take care as to how web pages fallback when the plug-in is no available, and follow certain security practices such as sandboxing websites in their own domain, and not let them use your plug-in to read or write an arbitrary file without the user's knowledge and permission.