Is javascript a dieing language? I personally feel it doesn't belong on webpages but I would like to hear others opinions.
Not at all. Your concept is totally wrong. Javascript can not die like this. I think it will rule few more years to come.
I would disagree. With AJAX, Javascript is, in my opinion, becoming more globally used. It allows webmasters to have a nice presentable webpage and add functionally more easily than ever. If you take a look at Jquery and Jquery UI examples, you can see how what was a hard-confusing syntax (with getElementByID, etc) has become a simple few lines of codes. Then yet again, some users' may not have Javascript-enabled browsers, which significantly reduces those users' website usability and adding more programming time into the equation. I believe the pros outweigh the cons for Javascript with the addition of Jquery.
While I have the exact opposite reaction -- jQuery asshattery taking clear verbose code, making it needlessly/pointlessly cryptic, and crapping all over the page by including a library file that by itself would eat up HALF what I generally set as a target for HTML+CSS+SCRIPTS+IMAGES on a template. I'm actually with the OP in that I'd say 90% or more of what's on websites for scripting, in particular the asshat BS of using jQuery, mootools and other crap to DESTROY the usefulness and functionality of websites... and for what, some stupid animated BS? Really sad part is there are so many jquery based scripts floating around right now that would actually be smaller and more efficient code WITHOUT the idiotic bloated library crap... but of course that would actually involve learning Javascript -- GOD FORBID. NOT that Javascript is dying or doesn't serve a purpose, but that purpose should be to ENHANCE functionality, not supplant it. Much of the 'new' stuff being introduced like CANVAS (which IMHO has no business having a HTML element assigned to it -- but that's HTML 5 idiocy, another topic unto itself) could be really useful and may someday replace flash -- when/if the AUDIO API stops being a rinky toy with audible popping on loops and ridiculously high latency, when/if we can get a timer accuracy higher than 33 times a second, etc, etc... Much of the problem with JS though simply lies with it's overuse -- using it to do CSS' job, using it to do something the markup is more than capable of handling, using it to do things that should be handled server-side, and in general just throwing jQuery and other idiotic libraries like MooTools at pages just to make sure they don't work right and take forever to load. Which is why 90% of the crap people use jQuery for I wouldn't put on a website in the first damned place, and the rest I could code smaller/leaner/faster without it. It's a sleazy shortcut at best, "gee ain't it neat" idiocy at worst that seems more out to stroke the developers ego than it is about making fast loading, useful and accessible websites. No, it's not dying out -- more's the shame... Though if you mean dieing, then yes, people are stamping out cookie-cutter style endless pointless libraries thrown at pages for no good reason. It's why webmail is less useful than it was a decade ago sending me back to using mail clients (something six years ago I could have sworn were destined to go the way of the dodo), it's part of why Google is quickly turning into the opposite of what made them great in the first place, its' why it's near impossible to order anything on Amazon anymore, and why we're seeing endless idiotic crap websites where people are blowing a megabyte or more in hundreds of separate files on sending less than 2k of plaintext and maybe a dozen content images. People are using it when inappropriate, then slapping sleazeball shortcut libraries on it to try and justify it -- making noodle doodle idiotic claims about it being 'better' or 'easier' when to be frank, most such developers need to do us all a favor, back the **** away from the keyboard, and take up something a bit less detail oriented like macramé.