On Thu, Jan 23, 2020 at 3:37 PM D. Hugh Redelmeier via talk <[email protected]> wrote: > > | From: o1bigtenor via talk <[email protected]> > > | In this vein - - - - a contact who in computer terms calls himself a > dinosaur > | refuses to allow javascript on his computers doing all his browsing on text > | based browsers. In his opinion javascript is a serious accident already in > free > | fall. What you're sharing only emphasizes that. Maybe its time to join his > | anti Javascript position? >
Thank you for your response!! > The issues are a little more intricate. They usually are - - - grin. > > Note npm is a repo (mostly?) for JavaScript to run under node.hs. > node.js is a server-side thing. It runs JavaScript on the server. Not in > the client (browser). > > JavaScript itself isn't terrible. > > What is unfortunate, I think, is the unfettered creativity JavaScript > in the browser allows web designers. They misuse it, just like they > did Adobe Flash previously. To some extent this is caused by the good > sides of JavaScript: how easy it is to learn, how easy it is to wip up > complexity, how easy it is for the page creator to take control of the > browser experience. From what little I know what I"m thinking is that the browser user needs to have some tools to control what the browser does - - - - that seems to be unobtanium at this point. > > What I was talking about was how easy it is to inject malicious code into > the ecosystem. That isn't actually the fault of the language. (It is > imaginable that one could design a language that prevented some abuse.) > > In fact, the language+browser have been designed to limit the damage > that could be inflicted on the client side. The npn problem is mostly > server-side, I think (I'm not sure). > > Making something easier (cheaper, faster, more understandable, ...) > allows it to be used more, often to excess. Unexpected side effects > can ensue. > > - increasing efficiency of cars makes driving cheaper so people > drive more and end up using more total energy (gasoline). Our obsession with individual transportation has become a major cost factor in one's personal economy. > > - computers became a lot cheaper. So a lot more money is spent on > computers. > > - programming has become easier. So a lot more pointless programs have > been created. > > - when I worked on optimizing compilers, I thought that I was trying > to make existing programs run faster. Then it struck me that it > allowed programmers to write programs in a simpler and clearer way > and have the compiler eliminate the performance cost. Interesting. > > Here's a random example of npm use: > > <https://www.electronjs.org/> > --- Thanks for the sharing! I'm wondering if there even is a way of reining in the wild possibilities in javascript in a browser. If there is it would be quite nice if this would happen quite soon. I'm finding that the web has become quite a frustrating and a very very far from useful place to look for things. Regards --- Post to this mailing list [email protected] Unsubscribe from this mailing list https://gtalug.org/mailman/listinfo/talk
