4 ms·

Fwiw, the function syntax in Typescript/Javascript is generally expressive enough to use as a basis for DSLs, and not needing to use macros for this also has a

by MrJohz 4y ago

Fwiw, the function syntax in Typescript/Javascript is generally expressive enough to use as a basis for DSLs, and not needing to use macros for this also has a lot of benefits. I'm a big fan of Rust, but I find often library authors overuse custom syntax in macros when just writing functions would have been easier, just as expressive, and much simpler to integrate with an IDE. Where macros do exist in Javascript-land, they tend to be either to implement upcoming features, or as optimisation tools (e.g. converting CSS-in-JS expressions at build-time rather than run-time). The one exception here is probably JSX, but even there lots of people prefer to use function calls instead. But for things like testing blocks, configuration, HTML/CSS generation, etc, it's generally enough to use the language by itself.

AlchemistCamp 4y ago
If JavaScript is “expressive enough to use as a basis for DSLs”, why do you suppose it is that various explicit attempts to recreate RoR in JS, going way back to SailsJS have failed to recreate its router DSL or even similarly terse models or controllers? Of course not everyone wants a Rails-inspired MVC framework experience, but why do you figure even those who did couldn’t achieve the same level of syntactic sugar? (I know Ruby doesn’t have macros either, but it does have enough expressiveness in a few other ways to do some things Python and even JS can’t)
- MrJohz 4y ago
  It's interesting that you mention Python, because obviously the RoR equivalent there is Django which leaves something to be desired when it comes to DSLs and expressive APIs. Symphony and Laravel also come to mind here, and I guess Spring in the Java world. I think it's difficult to argue that the creation of a major web framework hinges on being able to express things in a nice DSL. Rather, I think the truth is that server-side Javascript tends to be used in a different way to Ruby - generally Node projects that I've worked on are much smaller (and often coupled with other similarly-sized services), and are often just minimal APIs designed to act as a middleman between a database and a front-end application. It's not an issue with missing expressivity, but rather a tendency not to need (or at least, not to want) the full-featured powerhouse that is RoR.

by MrJohz 4y ago

AlchemistCamp 4y ago

If JavaScript is “expressive enough to use as a basis for DSLs”, why do you suppose it is that various explicit attempts to recreate RoR in JS, going way back to SailsJS have failed to recreate its router DSL or even similarly terse models or controllers? Of course not everyone wants a Rails-inspired MVC framework experience, but why do you figure even those who did couldn’t achieve the same level of syntactic sugar? (I know Ruby doesn’t have macros either, but it does have enough expressiveness in a few other ways to do some things Python and even JS can’t)

MrJohz 4y ago
It's interesting that you mention Python, because obviously the RoR equivalent there is Django which leaves something to be desired when it comes to DSLs and expressive APIs. Symphony and Laravel also come to mind here, and I guess Spring in the Java world. I think it's difficult to argue that the creation of a major web framework hinges on being able to express things in a nice DSL. Rather, I think the truth is that server-side Javascript tends to be used in a different way to Ruby - generally Node projects that I've worked on are much smaller (and often coupled with other similarly-sized services), and are often just minimal APIs designed to act as a middleman between a database and a front-end application. It's not an issue with missing expressivity, but rather a tendency not to need (or at least, not to want) the full-featured powerhouse that is RoR.