So far, I like the idea of exponentiation having identical precedence to unary `+`/`-`, and lower than the increment operators. That sounds like it should work pretty well.
``` x ** y // x^y -x ** y // -(x^y) x ** -y // x^(-y) ++x ** y === (++x) ** y x++ ** y === (x++) ** y x ** ++y === x ** (++y) x ** y++ === x ** (y++) ``` On Tue, Aug 25, 2015, 12:17 Thomas <thomasjamesfos...@bigpond.com> wrote: > This may be of some relevance: > https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Order_of_operations#Special_cases > > Exponentiation is clearly exponentially more complicated in terms of order > of operations and precedence than other operators if the desire is to > follow 'standard maths'. Otherwise, making Exponentiation behave > differently in JavaScript to how it does elsewhere is going to be a > constant source of bugs and needing parentheses just to get the desire > behaviour negates the whole point of making it an operator vs a function. > > Thomas > > On 26 Aug 2015, at 1:49 AM, Allen Wirfs-Brock <al...@wirfs-brock.com> > wrote: > > > On Aug 25, 2015, at 8:11 AM, Mark S. Miller wrote: > > I think we should drop the feature. Given the conflict between > > > * the history of ** in other languages, > > * the general pattern that unary binds tighter than binary > > > any solution at this point will confuse many people. These confusions will > not result in a confusing static rejection but in runtime behavior that > *sometimes* violates expectations. I was all for adding ** to the language > when it did not have these problems. But it does. The minor convenience it > adds is not worth these costs. By contrast, no one is confused about the > parsing of calls to Math.pow. > > > When in doubt, leave it out. > > > I've had the same reaction to this recent thread. It seems like the > functional form (Math.pow) is a much less confusing formulation for use in > JS expressions. > > It's interesting to note that while early "algebraic languages" such as > FORTRAN, Algol 60, BASIC, PL/I all had exponentiation operators the next > couple generations of similar languages including Pascal, C, C++, Java, and > C# do not. Each of those languages could have had an exponentiation > operator but choose to exclude it. > > The utility of an exponentiation operation may simply not be worth the > complexity and potential for confusion it introduces into a language with a > rich set of operators. > > Allen > _______________________________________________ > es-discuss mailing list > es-discuss@mozilla.org > https://mail.mozilla.org/listinfo/es-discuss > > _______________________________________________ > es-discuss mailing list > es-discuss@mozilla.org > https://mail.mozilla.org/listinfo/es-discuss >
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