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JavaScript right on the hardware

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Re: JavaScript right on the hardware

#261

Post by PommeDeTerre »

driverdan wrote: post #207
PommeDeTerre wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've dealt with these kind of programmers on numerous occasions. While they may claim to know other programming languages, they usually don't know much about them at all, in reality. If they do know another language, it's PHP, which is just about as bad as JavaScript in most respects. Any programmer who has real experience with a variety of different programming languages will become very aware of how inferior JavaSc…

What a bunch of pompous bullshit. From what you've said it seems you've never met a talented JS programmer.

I've met talented JavaScript programmers. They're just quite good at using other languages, too, and thus choose not to use JavaScript whenever possible.

Re: JavaScript right on the hardware

#262

Post by nfoz »

taf2 wrote: post #110
dysoco wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Of all the great languages out there... we had to choose Javascript. It's a shame, would love to see more Smalltalk posts.

JS is great - it's so hackable, via simple straightforward syntax that's familiar to anyone who programmed in c,c++,c#,java,php and is similar in ease of use to python and ruby - why on earth would you think it's a bad thing... Javascript is easy - few constructs that together can build just about anything is a big plus IMO - to each is thier own right

Many of JS's "straightforward syntax" that "looks similar" to other languages, is subtly different in profound and dangerous ways.

Re: JavaScript right on the hardware

#263

Post by nfoz »

ontouchstart wrote: post #118

JavaScript is the most deployed dynamic embedded programming language in the world (consider all the web browsers on desktop computers and mobile devices). If we expland this environment to customer hardware, we also expand our view of UI/UX to a different level. We should thank Moore's law.

Are you implying that JS developers know more about UI/UX than others?

Most websites have horrible usability, ranging from "everything in CSS popups!" to "every site uses a different widget toolkit, deficient in new and exciting ways".....

I hope I just don't understand your comment.

Re: JavaScript right on the hardware

#264

Post by PommeDeTerre »

thedufer wrote: post #212
PommeDeTerre wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've dealt with these kind of programmers on numerous occasions. While they may claim to know other programming languages, they usually don't know much about them at all, in reality. If they do know another language, it's PHP, which is just about as bad as JavaScript in most respects. Any programmer who has real experience with a variety of different programming languages will become very aware of how inferior JavaSc…

Well, that's just unnecessarily offensive. I'm proficient in Python, Java, and C, and was at some point also fluent in PHP, Ruby, and Lisp. While I wouldn't particularly enjoy coding in Javascript, CoffeeScript is, to date, the best language I've worked with. I debug in JavaScript, so I'm not that far away from it. Why is "class-based OO" necessary? There's nothing wrong with prototypal inheritance. The way modules a…

There's nothing "offensive" about pointing out realities, even if they may be painful for some people to accept.

I find your arguments somewhat odd. You do openly admit that you "wouldn't particularly enjoy coding in Javascript". People don't say such things about good programming languages, especially when arguing in favor of them to some extent.

I also find it odd that you argue that there's nothing wrong with prototype-based OO, yet claim that CoffeeScript is the best language you've worked with. One of CoffeeScript's most useful and important features is that it adds very simplistic class-based OO to JavaScript. Go look at the example code in the "Classes, Inheritance, and Super" section of the CoffeeScript home page to see what I'm talking about. The CoffeeScript code is tolerable; the JavaScript that's outputted is horrendous. Hand-written JavaScript is often just as bad, if not worse.

The various JavaScript "module" systems are purely hacks. They abuse existing language features to fake modularity, poorly. They're nothing like the proper module support of other languages. And at least you admit that semicolon insertion and the broken comparison operators are serious issues. Many other JavaScript advocates refuse to, for whatever reason.

There's nothing wrong with admitting that JavaScript is a really bad language. I think you know that it is, and want to admit it, and I think you should. It doesn't deserve to be defended, because its problems are generally inexcusable in every respect.

Re: JavaScript right on the hardware

#265

Post by PommeDeTerre »

mradmin wrote: post #247
mayanksinghal wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

CoffeeScript is JS. And to be more honest and judgemental, CoffeeScript is the sweeter-but-poorly-documented Javascript. The reason people are attempting to put javascript everywhere is because they can and because others enjoy it. And those who do enjoy JS, know what parts of JS are to be avoided at all costs. And I actually like it compared to other modern scripting languages for two reasons:(1) I don't have to wor…

What do you mean by "CoffeScript is JS"? CoffeeScript is not JavaScript. CoffeeScript compiles to JavaScript.

I suggest that you refer to the CoffeeScript home page: http://coffeescript.org/

It very clearly states, 'The golden rule of CoffeeScript is: "It's just JavaScript".'

Re: JavaScript right on the hardware

#266

Post by esailija »

thedufer wrote: post #212
PommeDeTerre wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've dealt with these kind of programmers on numerous occasions. While they may claim to know other programming languages, they usually don't know much about them at all, in reality. If they do know another language, it's PHP, which is just about as bad as JavaScript in most respects. Any programmer who has real experience with a variety of different programming languages will become very aware of how inferior JavaSc…

Well, that's just unnecessarily offensive. I'm proficient in Python, Java, and C, and was at some point also fluent in PHP, Ruby, and Lisp. While I wouldn't particularly enjoy coding in Javascript, CoffeeScript is, to date, the best language I've worked with. I debug in JavaScript, so I'm not that far away from it. Why is "class-based OO" necessary? There's nothing wrong with prototypal inheritance. The way modules a…

This is the key. With good conventions and tools it is perfectly fine language. The concept of "Programming into one's language" from Code Complete applies strongly:

> Programmers who program "in" a language limit their thoughts to constructs that the language directly supports. If the language tools are primitive, the programmer's thoughts will also be primitive.

> Programmers who program "into" a language first decide what thoughts they want to express, and then they determine how to express those thoughts using the tools provided by their specific language.

I disagree with Coffeescript though, nothing will make that shit readable to me. :P

Re: JavaScript right on the hardware

#267

Post by PommeDeTerre »

dkuntz2 wrote: post #194
DonPellegrino wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It takes less than an hour to learn and get used to it if you know the standard Java-style OOP already. It's worth it and it'll give you a whole new opinion on what OOP means. I made this a while ago, see if you can figure out how it works: http://jsfiddle.net/AXTdj/

I know how it works, I just find it worse, by far. There's a whole lot more overhead to getting it working, specifically all of the foo.prototype stuff, and it doesn't require that everything be together. Sure, it's kinda nice that you're able to extends objects later on, but I'd rather have everything neatly declared in one place. It definitely does not "give me a whole new opinion on what OOP means", it furthers my…

It's very good to see more and more people openly admitting that JavaScript's prototype-based OO approach just isn't practical.

For far too long now we've had to hear JavaScript advocates go on and on about how good JavaScript's approach is. Yet over and over we see developers being forced to fake a limited subset of class-based OO one way or another, just to get their work done effectively.

Of course, there are multiple ways of faking class-based OO in JavaScript, with varying degrees of compatibility with one another. In any sizable JavaScript code base, especially if third-party libraries are used, these incompatibilities can become a very real issue, very quickly.

This is one of the things that the JavaScript community should have addressed years ago.

Re: JavaScript right on the hardware

#268

Post by 14113 »

coreyja wrote: post #174
14113 wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally it worries me because people can build whatever they want and call themselves "programmers". It encourages a state in the industry when knowing about data structures, hardware, turing machines or the other fundamentals of computer science are considered unecessary. Perhaps they are, from a business standpoint. However, it will eventually inhibit growth of the discipline as a whole. A common rebuttal to tha…

I understand where you are coming from, and I don't like the "it allows people to get into programming more easily" excuse either. But I don't really think it will inhibit growth. I think that it is more likely just to create two main groups of people that call themselves programmers. The people that know HTML and jQuery and the actual programmers. I don't think it will do anything to the growth of real programming,…

I think that segregation in of itself can be dangerous too though. People will get stuck in the web programmer mindset, and never progress if they're interested in anything else.

Re: JavaScript right on the hardware

#269

Post by 14113 »

smilekzs wrote: post #164
14113 wrote: post #153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And arduino is even more approachable again.

Don't you forget that Arduino is C++.

And? That's brilliant, as it provides some progression after learning the language! Once you're confident with Arduino, you can move onto C++, from there ASM, etc...

Re: JavaScript right on the hardware

#270

Post by PommeDeTerre »

dclowd9901 wrote: post #229
14113 wrote: post #156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally it worries me because people can build whatever they want and call themselves "programmers". It encourages a state in the industry when knowing about data structures, hardware, turing machines or the other fundamentals of computer science are considered unecessary. Perhaps they are, from a business standpoint. However, it will eventually inhibit growth of the discipline as a whole. A common rebuttal to tha…

You seem to think these programmers are content with simply learning only what they need to know and calling it a day. As a self taught developer, I find it offensive that you think I would go through all the trouble of teaching myself how to code, and then rest on my laurels, like I wasn't inherently curious and thoughtful. Since learning Javascript front to back, I've developed a curiosity with strictly typed langu…

I don't intend to offend you, but I think you illustrate a problem with many programmers who have come into the field with a self-taught JavaScript or PHP background, and without any sort of a formal education.

Type systems, complexity analysis, and assembly language programming, for example, aren't "hardcore disciplines in computing". They're the basic foundation upon which the rest of our knowledge is built. They are among the minimal level of knowledge that all programmers should have.

When you understand concepts such as those first, and are exposed to JavaScript later on, it's plainly obvious how inexcusably bad JavaScript is. While theory may not always work well in practice, JavaScript goes out of its way to ignore sensible and practical theory in every way possible.

People starting with JavaScript (or PHP; JavaScript isn't alone in being a bad language), but without this basic theoretical knowledge, don't seem to realize how bad the language truly is. It's unfortunate to see them not accept and admit to these flaws, even after the learn that there are much better ways of doing things.

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