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> good language design means you don't have to read the docs Let's assume JavaScript is a poorly-designed language, and Clojure is a well-designed language. In
by elwell 13y ago
> good language design means you don't have to read the docs
Let's assume JavaScript is a poorly-designed language, and Clojure is a well-designed language. In the first month of language use, the user of Clojure will have looked at the docs many more times.
- 1stop 13y agoBut the user of javascript will have more bugs.
- coldtea 13y agoThat's because: 1) Clojure has a larger API -- Javascript doesn't have 1/10 that. 2) Javascript has a familiar (to many) Algol-derrived braced syntax and lots of common C/C++/Java/etc keywords. Clojure is only familiar to Lisp/Scheme users. If those things were equal, Clojure would win the "don't have to look caveats up" contest, because its design is more coherent, and doesn't give you unexpected results and undefined behavior like Javascript does. Obviously, you somehow you need to first know that "parseInt" is called "parseInt()" and not "atoi()" for example. But I wasn't implying never reading anything, including function reference. Just being able to code without needing to study and/or memorize lots of arcane edge cases.