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Hi gruseom: I'm the author of the original post. There seems to be some serious (willful?) misunderstanding here about what is being proposed. Instead of addi

Hi gruseom: I'm the author of the original post. There seems to be some serious (willful?) misunderstanding here about what is being proposed. Instead of adding something foreign, the class syntax that we've nearly got settled is sugar for what we usually write in JS, albiet under a dozen or so different patterns and library conventions. See: http://infrequently.org/2011/09/why-class-doesnt-mean-what-you-think-it-means/ http://infrequently.org/2011/09/why-class-doesnt-mean-what-y... I'm also not suggesting that length of debate necessitates action. The near-consensus on the committee for adding classes isn't my doing; I'm merely arguing that it's worth doing a smaller thing and debating what extensions to make in due time. And if you look at what's being added (again, I'm not sure you have a grasp on it in any way), it's clear that we are doing no harm with Max/Min classes. Invoking Java to describe what's being proposed is purely a slur. Indeed, the arguments which I'm attempting to talk down are the ones which would drag a class proposal more towards Java (not less). What's frustrating, in the end, is to see someone so obviously smart making such spurious arguments. Please read up before engaging further: http://wiki.ecmascript.org/doku.php?id=strawman:maximally_minimal_classes http://wiki.ecmascript.org/doku.php?id=strawman:maximally_mi... Regards

gruseom 14y ago
I hear your annoyance. I hope it's only that my comment seemed that way because we're coming from very different perspectives. By "more like Java" I just meant adding classes at all. I'm uninterested in that way of programming - not out of ignorance, I did it for years and I think it's a gigantic cargo cult. That JS somehow escaped it is, in my view, a small miracle. That we have JS at all is a miracle. For all its flaws, it's a small, hackable, dynamic language that retained enough magic from its Lisp/Self inspirations to spawn a new galaxy of creativity. I don't believe that if it had been done more "properly" we'd be better off today. Great inventions often live on the improper side of the proper/improper divide. JS succeeded on the web while its "proper" cousin, the one designed for "programming in the large", the one organized around "good" practices (including classes), failed. I think that fact is deep and mysterious and the most important thing is not to mess with it. So while you say it's clear that you'd be doing no harm, that's far from clear to me. I read the links you provided and still think that. But I acknowledge there are degrees here, and if you're mostly trying to prevent JS from turning into Java, thanks. I confess, though, that when you say the near consensus, my sympathies immediately leap to whoever the holdout is :) Not trying to persuade you; just trying to unpack what I said enough to not seem thoughtlessly rude.

gruseom 14y ago

I hear your annoyance. I hope it's only that my comment seemed that way because we're coming from very different perspectives. By "more like Java" I just meant adding classes at all. I'm uninterested in that way of programming - not out of ignorance, I did it for years and I think it's a gigantic cargo cult. That JS somehow escaped it is, in my view, a small miracle. That we have JS at all is a miracle. For all its flaws, it's a small, hackable, dynamic language that retained enough magic from its Lisp/Self inspirations to spawn a new galaxy of creativity. I don't believe that if it had been done more "properly" we'd be better off today. Great inventions often live on the improper side of the proper/improper divide. JS succeeded on the web while its "proper" cousin, the one designed for "programming in the large", the one organized around "good" practices (including classes), failed. I think that fact is deep and mysterious and the most important thing is not to mess with it. So while you say it's clear that you'd be doing no harm, that's far from clear to me. I read the links you provided and still think that. But I acknowledge there are degrees here, and if you're mostly trying to prevent JS from turning into Java, thanks. I confess, though, that when you say the near consensus, my sympathies immediately leap to whoever the holdout is :) Not trying to persuade you; just trying to unpack what I said enough to not seem thoughtlessly rude.