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As an aside, I’m not seeing any novel features in this list. All of them seem to be borrowed from other languages (Swift, F#, Haskell, ...). With enough of thi

As an aside, I’m not seeing any novel features in this list. All of them seem to be borrowed from other languages (Swift, F#, Haskell, ...). With enough of this, at what point will all languages start to look identical (Youngme Moon calls this “homogeneous heterogeneity”)? And how often does a language come along that introduces something truly new, rather than porting an idea from another popular language?

dmitriid 8y ago
You’ve got to have a solid base before you jump to innovating and introducing something “truly new”.
macawfish 8y ago
Slightly different angle... but for me, the special thing about Javascript is that it comes with a whole web browser. Being able to do the stuff those other languages can do in the browser makes me happy :) I especially like the pipe operator, even though I think the `|>` is kinda clunky asthetically.
- bcherny 8y ago
  Since everyone is coming from different language backgrounds, I wonder if it’s better to treat JS/WASM as a low-level compile target, and simply compile peoples’ language of choice to JS (OCaml via Bucklescript, Scala via ScalaJS, Haskell via PureScript, Clojure via ClojureScript, etc). That way you avoid bloating the core language with everyone’s pet features (I’d also love pipe syntax, but am not sure it belongs in JS core).
  - int_19h 8y ago
    In principle, it's a fine idea, if we started with something like wasm. But JS the language is already horribly bloated in many ways, so it's hard to justify avoiding new features on the basis of KISS - that ship has sailed a long time ago. (OTOH, note that nobody is proposing to add this sort of high-level stuff to wasm. That's because it's designed to be a compilation target, and it's actually good at it.)
kristiandupont 8y ago
Why should every city have a theatre? Is there any reason to "leave features to others" if they make sense in your own language? The only issue I can come up with is that some language might die off because it doesn't have any unique features. But if that happens and the momentum is not enough to keep it alive, that doesn't seem like loss to me anyway.
- bcherny 8y ago
  I don’t know, it just feels like a bit of a boring world if every language looks the same, instead of prodding you to look at the world from a slightly different angle.
  - baddox 8y ago
    I really don’t see this criticism. Yes, all of these features have existed in some form in prior languages. But I wouldn’t say that this makes JS “look like” Haskell.
    - bcherny 8y ago
      Agreed. But if F#’s pipe operator makes it to Hack and JavaScript, null chaining makes it to C#, CoffeeScript, and JavaScript, value types make it to Haskell, Clojure, and JS, etc.. Eventually the overlap between different languages’ features grows larger.
      - mbo 8y ago
        Like, I absolutely agree with you here. Languages are starting to stabilise when it comes to syntax, features are getting cross pollinated from other languages faster, etc. I think it's wonderful. Developers can move between languages interchangeably, teaching burden is reduced, languages aren't dismissed because they lack feature X.
        bcherny 8y ago
        That’s a valid way to look at it, too.

dmitriid 8y ago

You’ve got to have a solid base before you jump to innovating and introducing something “truly new”.

macawfish 8y ago

Slightly different angle... but for me, the special thing about Javascript is that it comes with a whole web browser. Being able to do the stuff those other languages can do in the browser makes me happy :) I especially like the pipe operator, even though I think the `|>` is kinda clunky asthetically.

bcherny 8y ago
Since everyone is coming from different language backgrounds, I wonder if it’s better to treat JS/WASM as a low-level compile target, and simply compile peoples’ language of choice to JS (OCaml via Bucklescript, Scala via ScalaJS, Haskell via PureScript, Clojure via ClojureScript, etc). That way you avoid bloating the core language with everyone’s pet features (I’d also love pipe syntax, but am not sure it belongs in JS core).
- int_19h 8y ago
  In principle, it's a fine idea, if we started with something like wasm. But JS the language is already horribly bloated in many ways, so it's hard to justify avoiding new features on the basis of KISS - that ship has sailed a long time ago. (OTOH, note that nobody is proposing to add this sort of high-level stuff to wasm. That's because it's designed to be a compilation target, and it's actually good at it.)

kristiandupont 8y ago

Why should every city have a theatre? Is there any reason to "leave features to others" if they make sense in your own language? The only issue I can come up with is that some language might die off because it doesn't have any unique features. But if that happens and the momentum is not enough to keep it alive, that doesn't seem like loss to me anyway.

bcherny 8y ago
I don’t know, it just feels like a bit of a boring world if every language looks the same, instead of prodding you to look at the world from a slightly different angle.
- baddox 8y ago
  I really don’t see this criticism. Yes, all of these features have existed in some form in prior languages. But I wouldn’t say that this makes JS “look like” Haskell.
  - bcherny 8y ago
    Agreed. But if F#’s pipe operator makes it to Hack and JavaScript, null chaining makes it to C#, CoffeeScript, and JavaScript, value types make it to Haskell, Clojure, and JS, etc.. Eventually the overlap between different languages’ features grows larger.
    - mbo 8y ago
      Like, I absolutely agree with you here. Languages are starting to stabilise when it comes to syntax, features are getting cross pollinated from other languages faster, etc. I think it's wonderful. Developers can move between languages interchangeably, teaching burden is reduced, languages aren't dismissed because they lack feature X.
      - bcherny 8y ago
        That’s a valid way to look at it, too.