`Symbol.create()` together with others `Symbol.for()` and company would've been a "least surprise" choice with a `Symbol` spec'd like `Math`, `JSON` or other global objects ... but yeah, we have a precedent now, so I guess in the future will be like that.
On Mon, Aug 15, 2016 at 7:20 PM, Allen Wirfs-Brock <[email protected]> wrote: > > > On Aug 15, 2016, at 1:27 AM, Andrea Giammarchi < > [email protected]> wrote: > > > > FWIW, if `Object(Symbol()) instanceof Symbol` is true, and it is, we can > say `Symbol` is just an anomaly in the specs because it acts like other > primitive constructors but it throws if used as `new Symbol()`. > > > > Developers that would've written `new Symbol` are the same that write > `new Boolean` or `new Number` and `new String`. > > > > If these people don't put minimal effort to better learn/use the > programming language I wonder why the rest of the entire community should > be penalised with "quirks" like `Symbol` is. > > > The difference is that unlike Number/String/Boolean, there is not a > literal syntax for creating Symbol values. For those primitive types that > have a literal representation, it is very rare to ever need to explicitly > instantiate a wrapper object via `new` and hence the there is little chance > confusing the designation of a primitive value with instantiating a wrapper. > > Because Symbol does not have a syntactic literal form, some sort of > invocation is required to acquire a new unique primitive Symbol value. > That is where you get the potential for confusion between `Symbol()` and > `new Symbol()`. And minimizing this sort of mistake is not just a matter > of needing “better learning”. Even an experts can have momentary mental > slips and type a `new Symbol()` when they really meant `Symbol()`. > > In the future, I would expect any new primitive types that have literals > to follow the precedent of Number/String/Boolean and any that do not to > follow the precedent of Symbol. > > Allen
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