11–20 of 179 posts
I fail to comprehend how a single-function-library called "isNumber" even needs updating, much less "fairly frequently".
The debate around third-party code vs. self-developed is eternal. IMHO if you think you can do better than existing solutions for your use-case, then self-developed is the obvious choice. If you don't, then use third-party. This of course says a lot about those who need to rely on trivial libraries.
I suspect this might be seen as trolling, but why isn't there a standard lib of stuff like this? surely it can't be beyond the wit of programming kind to have a standard lib, or even layers of standard lib for Node? What is the argument for not having a standard lib, apart from download speed?
I sometimes hanker for a return to Fortran IV where every routine was separately compiled and the linker only put into the object code those that were referred to by something else.
Seems a lot like the classic "I put only a couple of the strong advantages and enumerate everything I could think about as disadvantage". While I'm bias (I've done a bunch of these micro-libraries myself), there's more reasons I/OSS devs do them! To name other advantages (as a dev consuming them): - Documentation: they are usually well documented, at least a lot better than your average internal piece of code. - Port…
Copy-paste the code into your internal library and maintain it yourself. Don't add a dependency on { "assert": "2.1.0" }. It probably doesn't do what you actually want, anyway.
I think the more interesting point is that most projects don't know what they actually need and the code is disposable. In that scenario micro-libraries make some amount of sense. Just import random code and see how far you can get.
I suspect this might be seen as trolling, but why isn't there a standard lib of stuff like this? surely it can't be beyond the wit of programming kind to have a standard lib, or even layers of standard lib for Node? What is the argument for not having a standard lib, apart from download speed?
I moved to option 3: in all my apps I include a function library that I build over the years, so I don't start from scratch every time. I deeply hate ("hate speech" example here) dependencies to libraries from all over the Internet due to security reasons, but I copy-paste code when needed to my library after I read, understand and check the code that I copy. The biggest advantage is that some of this code is better than what I could invent from scratch in a busy day and I save the time of doing it right. The disadvantage is there is no way to reward these authors that contribute to humankind.
PS. My function library has functions mostly written by me, over 80%, but it includes code written by others. In my case, every time I need a function I check my existing library first, then analyze whether to write or copy.
Another advantage is that because they're so minimal and self-contained, they're often "completed", because they achieved what they set out to do. So there's no need to continually patch it for security updates, or at least you need to do it less often, and it's less likely that you'll be dealing with breaking changes.
The UNIX philosophy is also build on the idea of small programs, just like micro-libraries, of doing one thing and one thing well, and composing those things to make larger things.
I would argue the problem is how dependencies in general are added to projects, which the blog author pointed out with left-pad. Copy-paste works, but I would argue the best way is to fork the libraries and add submodules to your project. Then if you want to pull a new version of the library, you can update the fork and review the changes. It's an explicit approach to managing it that can prevent a lot of pitfalls like malicious actors, breaking changes leading to bugs, etc.
and because it updates fairly frequently I fail to comprehend how a single-function-library called "isNumber" even needs updating, much less "fairly frequently". The debate around third-party code vs. self-developed is eternal. IMHO if you think you can do better than existing solutions for your use-case, then self-developed is the obvious choice. If you don't, then use third-party. This of course says a lot about th…
Micro-libraries are really good actually, they're highly modular, self-contained code, often making it really easy to understand what's going on. Another advantage is that because they're so minimal and self-contained, they're often "completed", because they achieved what they set out to do. So there's no need to continually patch it for security updates, or at least you need to do it less often, and it's less likely…
Well I think that is the point, they're not self-contained. You are adding mystery stuff and who knows how deep the chain of dependencies go. See the left-pad fiasco that broke so much stuff, because the chain of transitive dependencies ran deep and wide.
NPM is a dumpster fire in this regard. I try to avoid it - is there a flag you can set to say "no downstream dependencies" or something when you add a dependency? At least that way you can be sure things really are self-contained.
I suspect this might be seen as trolling, but why isn't there a standard lib of stuff like this? surely it can't be beyond the wit of programming kind to have a standard lib, or even layers of standard lib for Node? What is the argument for not having a standard lib, apart from download speed?
Why isn't there some kind of 'compiler/linker/stripper' that would collect the functions actually used and compile them into an application specific library? Yes I know that dynamic dispatch makes that difficult but the programmer does surely know which functions he wants to call. I sometimes hanker for a return to Fortran IV where every routine was separately compiled and the linker only put into the object code tho…
I suspect this might be seen as trolling, but why isn't there a standard lib of stuff like this? surely it can't be beyond the wit of programming kind to have a standard lib, or even layers of standard lib for Node? What is the argument for not having a standard lib, apart from download speed?
There are many ways to look at this. Maybe the standard lib of such functions should be implemented as native functions in the language (1). Or as a standard external function library (2). Or people should copy-paste the functions they need and keep in their organization's function library (3). I am sure there are a few more options. I moved to option 3: in all my apps I include a function library that I build over t…
Micro-libraries are really good actually, they're highly modular, self-contained code, often making it really easy to understand what's going on. Another advantage is that because they're so minimal and self-contained, they're often "completed", because they achieved what they set out to do. So there's no need to continually patch it for security updates, or at least you need to do it less often, and it's less likely…