Based on what evidence are "we" concluding that the majority of the
javascript developers want -> syntax for functions? The fact that
coffeescript is the hot buzzword? Was there some developer-community wide
voting or poll that I missed? Or is it that a few vocal people on these
lists like it, and that's being substituted as what the "majority" is in
favor of?
IIRC there were cheers at JSConf this week.
Yeah, I unfortunately wasn't able to attend. I was quite sad about missing
JSConf for the first time.
But, JSConf has just 150-200 JavaScript developers in attendance. While they
are certainly some of the most passionate (and intelligent) developers of
the community, no doubt, they are definitely not a representative sampling
of the overall community. Making language decisions based on the vocal
support of JSConf alone is not sufficient. I was certain there had to be
more behind the claim than just that. So that's what I was asking for.
But you're looking for something that doesn't exist: a way to make
scientifically sound decisions about language design.
I am not looking for any such thing. I was looking for more detail behind
Brendan's (and Andrew's) assertions that -> is definitively better because
it's shorter (and for no other stated reason).
There is *no* way to resolve syntax questions perfectly. We welcome
community input, all community input.
I don't claim that any such perfect system could be devised. I was merely
responding to Andrew's insinuation that the majority of the community
(including him) had already voiced support for ->. If someone makes an
implication, I think it's fair game on here to ask for the supporting
reasoning.
I think I could easily come up with a dozen examples of patterns in
JavaScript coding which are shorter, but which "most of the community" would
say is *not* more readable. So I take issue with the assertion that
shorter==better unequivocally.
But we are going to have to make a decision, and it simply won't be
perfect. We're going to listen to everyone, consider the technical issues,
and at the end of the day, make the best decision we can with imperfect
information.
From the tone of this thread, and from many other recent postings regarding
reactions from JSConf this week, it sounded like all of a sudden we'd gone
from "yeah coffeescript has some interesting short-hand syntax" to "the
community has spoken, and coffeescript will be adopted into ES.Harmony/Next
as-is".
I was, and am now, still wondering how "we" so quickly made the leap from
Brendan's "harmony of my dreams" a couple of months ago, where the idea of #
sounded good, and plausible for inclusion, all the way to Brendan declaring
that it's basically a done deal that we'll be including a variety of
function and other shorthands from coffeescript post haste?
--Kyle
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