JavaScript developers are incredible at problem solving, unfortunately • Hacker News Board

Re: JavaScript developers are incredible at problem solving, unfortunately

#41

Post by atinoda-kestrel » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 11:19 PM UTC

bwaxxlo wrote: post #21

SomeCallMeTim wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Prototypal inheritance works well, if you understand it. It's only "wrong" if you're of the Java/C++ OOP religion.

I find most people who have gripes with JS prototypes are the ones who are used to classical inheritance. Overall, the more I understand JS, the more I'm convinces most issues raised are personal preferences.

> I find most people who have gripes with JS prototypes are the ones who are used to classical inheritance.

Counterpoint: Scheme/Lisp/FP fans also don't tend to like it. Myself included.

Re: JavaScript developers are incredible at problem solving, unfortunately

#42

Post by dazhbog » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 11:19 PM UTC

Nadya wrote: post #14

I'm not sure how to interpret the last part... "Where I am from, the point of digging is not freedom from digging." Is it a statement that the point of digging is to reach further and learn more (positive)? Is it a statement more along the lines of "We dig because we must dig to survive." (negative)? Or possibly that digging is simply a way of life (negative)?

I took it as a positive meaning.. The point of digging (suffering as a dev from all these new shiny things) is to reach a purity/elegance when writing code not only to just create/finish the project.

Another way of seeing it is when we fix bugs. Instead of fixing one thing and finishing it, we like to touch and try to fix all the things (mostly when we own the code).. Essentially digging your own grave.. sometimes.. :)

Re: JavaScript developers are incredible at problem solving, unfortunately

#43

Post by pags » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 11:22 PM UTC

lkrubner wrote: post #34

felixgallo wrote: post #8

One wonders how we get out of this mess. You'd have thought that Microsoft/Google/Apple/whomever would have at least tried to include a better alternative language in their browser by now. What stops them besides inertia?

X, Flash, Swing, JavaFX, SilverLight, AWT and more were all attempts to offer a GUI over TCP. The important question is why they all failed. This is a complex issue and many good essays have been written that address parts of the question. Still, I think most of it can be boiled down to 3 things: 1.) some were closed-source and proprietary 2.) some were needlessly verbose, or enforced a workflow that made it difficul…

One was killed by Apple.

Re: JavaScript developers are incredible at problem solving, unfortunately

#44

Post by freyr » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 11:23 PM UTC

felixgallo wrote: post #8

One wonders how we get out of this mess. You'd have thought that Microsoft/Google/Apple/whomever would have at least tried to include a better alternative language in their browser by now. What stops them besides inertia?

At the end of the day, you'll still be tied to the DOM, tied to poorly specified and poorly implemented HTML specifications (e.g, ContentEditable), tied to browser incompatibilities, and tied to CSS.

So the problem isn't just the lack of a viable JavaScript alternative. The problem is building on top of a weak, fractured foundation that was designed for an entirely different application than we now want.

Re: JavaScript developers are incredible at problem solving, unfortunately

#45

Post by mightybyte » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 11:23 PM UTC

tim333 wrote: post #10

felixgallo wrote: post #8

One wonders how we get out of this mess. You'd have thought that Microsoft/Google/Apple/whomever would have at least tried to include a better alternative language in their browser by now. What stops them besides inertia?

They've tried Typescript and Dart. No massive uptake to date. WebAssembly may be a way forward.

If WebAssembly doesn't get proper support for tail call optimization, then IMO it's not the way forward. Right now it's listed as a future feature[1] so color me skeptical.

[1] https://github.com/WebAssembly/design/blob/master/FutureFeat...

Re: JavaScript developers are incredible at problem solving, unfortunately

#46

Post by wwwtyro » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 11:27 PM UTC

"Problem: asm.js is basically unwritable by humans."

I have no idea where this is coming from, but it's simply untrue. See [1] for a ton of examples of it being perfectly human read/writable.

All I can come up with is that people are looking at code compiled to asm.js, which is of course going to have all semantic meaning stripped from it, no different than code compiled to javascript.

[1] http://asmjs.org/spec/latest/

Re: JavaScript developers are incredible at problem solving, unfortunately

#47

Post by vbnmvbnmvbnm » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 11:30 PM UTC

Nadya wrote: post #39

mattchamb wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I take it to mean that if you keep digging, the hole will just be deeper. I.e. you cant dig yourself out of a hole.

What are you doing when you "dig into a problem"? :) I have a feeling the intent was supposed to be pessimistic/negative (as you stated). I decided to have some fun with the words. It leaves a few possibilities as to the meaning and speaks well of what the developers are typically doing in their "problem solving": digging deeper (for knowledge) rather than trying to get out of a hole. "People who cannot dig themselve…

The interpretation is left open to the reader. It could be a negative and cynical nod to the idea that we're doomed, and digging our way straight to hell, or possibly a coy wink at an absurd paradox of conflicting goals among participants.

Re: JavaScript developers are incredible at problem solving, unfortunately

#48

Post by kentor » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 11:34 PM UTC

UUMMUU wrote: post #40

I'm lost as to why Grunt is a problem. I tried to put all of my build scripts in the package.json but moving to Grunt has been incredibly useful.

Because "code over configuration". Personally I'm not a fan of Grunt's API which requires huge json files where keys mean special things. It feels very ad hoc and ugly. Gulp's API is like 5 functions.

Re: JavaScript developers are incredible at problem solving, unfortunately

#49

Post by daenz » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 11:36 PM UTC

blhack wrote: post #9

This is absolutely a NIGHTMARE for new developers. People come into the language, and there are what seems like an infinite number of "the only right" ways to do something, all of vary degrees of complexity/usefulness, and all claiming that they are god's gift to computer science. That last part is the part that is most frustrating to me, and it isn't unique to javascript. Google, facebook, yahoo, etc. have all gotte…

> But my god the cognitive load involved in swimming through all of the "this library literally saves THE WORLD" marketing fluff is intense.

The problem with javascript libraries and frameworks is that, since the language itself has so many warts and quirks, it's easy to make a lot of "progress" patching over them with your unique library. So you come out on the other side, having won all these tiny victories, making things more sane, and I imagine most authors will believe their library literally "saves the day", when in reality, it just makes the language suck less.

Re: JavaScript developers are incredible at problem solving, unfortunately

#50

Post by copperx » Thu, Jul 09, 2015, 11:40 PM UTC

agumonkey wrote: post #18

Xeoncross wrote: post #13

I learned a while ago that it doesn't matter how broken something is if everyone is using it. Humans are incredibly resourceful, if not also short-sighted. Look at PHP, look at Javascript, look at Wordpress, look at email, look at the original jQuery etc...

Universities try to convey this. My final year was more about project management, technology was one variable and nothing else (one of few values of UML is that it tries to be agnostic, even though hyper c++/OOP centric). And thanks to Sir Turing and his friends, you know you can always solve the problem with whatever language/system you have.

> And thanks to Sir Turing and his friends, you know you can always solve the problem with whatever language/system you have.

I'm tired of hearing this. Theoretically true, but infeasible in practice. Try to build an OS in JavaScript and see how long it takes you.