What Makes AppleScript Special?

AppleScript has a number of features that set it apart from both macro programs and scripting languages that control a single program:

AppleScript uses an English-like terminology that makes it easy for nontechnical users to write scripts. For more experienced users, it is far easier to write powerful scripts with AppleScript and to understand and maintain scripts written by others than it is with a standard programming language.
You can easily save a script as a stand-alone script application --an application whose only function is to run the script associated with it.
AppleScript makes it easy to refer to data within applications. Scripts can use familiar names to refer to familiar objects. For example, a script can refer to file, disk, and window objects in the Mac OS Finder, or to row, column, and cell objects in a spreadsheet.
You can control multiple applications from a single script. Although many applications include built-in scripting or macro languages, most of these languages work for only one application. In contrast, you can use AppleScript to control any of the applications that support it. You don't have to learn a new language for each application.
You can write scripts that control applications on more than one computer. A single script can control any number of applications, and the applications can be on any computer on a given network.