Languages *evolve*. It means that at some point something will be introduced
that may break existing user code.
I understand that with JS the problem is compounded a billion-fold (JS is used
quite literally everywhere).
However: Looking at the evolution of JS we can see that new entities and new
assumptions (potentially breaking user code) are continuously added to and
removed from JS (as they should).
So, in my opinion, the argument for not adding new global entities such as
System, or Module, or Loader (or heck, even all three of them) being “these are
not keywords, we can’t introduce them” is really really weak.
On Sat, 05 Aug 2017 at 12:45 "T.J. Crowder"
<
mailto:
> wrote:
a, pre, code, a:link, body { word-wrap: break-word !important; }
On Sat, Aug 5, 2017 at 11:05 AM, Naveen Chawla
<
mailto:[email protected]
> wrote:
>
> Does existing code use modules??? My understanding is that
> modules are a recent concept.
Yes, people have been using ES2015-style modules for a couple of years now
(obviously, modules in general much longer than that), via transpilers and
bundlers, and recently with some initial native implementations (Chrome v60 has
it behind a flag, I think v61 will have it by default; I believe there's a
Safari tech preview). But I mostly meant code in general (and/or which is
bundled up in a module at some point), not module-specific code.
> And the `module` keyword would only apply in actual modules
I imagine that's possible. In general, something that's an identifier in some
code but a keyword in other code doesn't sound like a good idea to me. But
there's something *like* a precedent: Until ES5, you couldn't use a keyword as
a literal property name (e.g., in a property accessor -- `element.class` and
`element.for` were famously syntax errors, leading to the DOM using `className`
and `htmlFor` instead); as of ES5, you can, because the context is sufficiently
clear that the accessor and object initializer productions could use
*IdentifierName* rather than *Identifier*. Your concept goes further, making
the *same production* parse as a keyword in *ModuleBody* code but an identifier
in *ScriptBody* code.
These issues don't exist with `import`, which has been a "future" reserved word
for 20 years. So while `module` may be *slightly* more semantically obvious, I
think you'll struggle to get people on-board with the complexity of adding a
context-sensitive keyword.
-- T.J. Crowder_______________________________________________
es-discuss mailing list
[email protected]
https://mail.mozilla.org/listinfo/es-discuss
