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Comment by atoko | Hacker News Reader

I feel like this is some sort of signaling, a la 'no true programmer uses javascript, because types!'.

Well then, if no true programmer likes dynamically typed languages, I'd better make some calls...

Hey, RMS, Abelson, Sussman, Steele, Guido, Larry, Matz, Richard Gabriel, ESR, DHH, Flatt, and Felleisen, it turns out you're not true programmers! Okay, cool.

Needless to say, I claim No True Scottsman.

I see it like; smart,disciplined programmers are capable of writing complex programs in dynamically typed languages without making as many errors.

Lisp, though, does have types.

All languages have types. Lisp, however, and particularly the versions that those people worked with, are dynamically typed, like Javascript. Unlike JS, they aren't weakly typed, but that's not the point. To say nothing of Ruby and Python, for which there are also programmers on that list.

Common Lisp compilers may implement static typing. The default type is T, though — but with declarations, a compiler can enforce anything the programmer declares or it infers.

Most of those people either worked with MACLisp, or dynamically typed Scheme.

I used to half joke like this, but recently I've been doing some React work in ES6 with Flowtype annotations. It's actually not that bad.

Exactly. Flow even has tagged unions now, and `maybe` types. TypeScript is also a very mature solution to this problem. A true professional works with whatever language he needs to solve his/her problem, and shores up that language with the best tools available.

In this case, I half agree, because I think mobile development is best done using native platforms. But if you're doing web development, JavaScript is a must. And React is an elegant way to handle browser UI (Flow/Redux is also quite nice way to handle browser state, if a bit verbose).

I do share his concerns about the patent clause, and about Facebook's long-term commitment to the project, but at the level of personal projects, these concerns have not been enough to scare me away.

"A true professional works with whatever language he needs to solve his/her problem, and shores up that language with the best tools available."

Right. And JavaScript is not that language, unless you are doing web stuff.

> Right. And JavaScript is not that language, unless you are doing web stuff.

Do I hear an echo in here?

"I think mobile development is best done using native platforms. But if you're doing web development, JavaScript is a must."

A true Scotsman comment nested in another true Scotsman comment. It's haggis all the way down!

We all use it, but 'no true programmer likes javascript.' :)

I must not be a true programmer, then. :/

I know plenty of intelligent and accomplished programmers who use and like JavaScript. I like poking fun at it every now and then, but come on.

I quite like JavaScript for relatively light scripting tasks. In that role, I find it pretty well-suited.

For complex applications I'm as leery of it as anyone else.

Since apparently people are missing my ':)' above, they are missing that I replied to what I thought was a joke with another joke. So just to be clear, it was a joke. Sigh.

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