JS as a language isn't nearly as big as C++ or, say, Swift... I'd say Python complexity is on par or even higher than JS, in terms of core language features.
There are some language features that are outdated but it's hardly like the C++ situation.
Working Draft, Standard for Programming Language C++ from 2020-01-14 (1815 pages): https://www.open-std.org/jtc1/sc22/wg21/docs/papers/2020/n48...
I'm not sure what's the "correct" spec for the current C++ standard is. Still a big difference between these languages, but 846 pages isn't exactly small either.
Meanwhile, the ECMAScript spec really does not leave very much wiggle room. It (like every other web standard) is almost just documentation or often even pseudocode-ification of an actual implementation... Certainly makes you think.
Intel 64 and IA-32 Architectures Software Developer’s Manual, Volume 2 Instruction Set Reference (2552 pages!!!): https://cdrdv2-public.intel.com/774492/325383-sdm-vol-2abcd....
The ECMAScript language spec is closer to the C spec than the C++ spec, by a large margin. I'm not sure how much you can deduce about relative complexity from these figures.
Note: I'm a moderate JS dev so correct me if I'm wrong.
For objects with methods you can make literals, use a constructor with new and have prototype methods, use a class, or use Object.extend, or Object.create or probably other tricks.
For async code we have callbacks or promises. And promises can just use the Promise class and .then(), or you can use async / await. And the promise class also has polyfills in npm if you want that instead. Or there’s tricks with generators.
Functions can be written with function foo(), or const foo = function(), or const foo = () => {…}. Or const container = { foo() {} }. Or use class methods (which have different syntax again).
Importing external code can use commonjs (require()). Or import statements. Or dynamic import. In the browser you can use multiple script tags and have scripts assign their library to a global object. In nodejs code can also change what require does.
I can keep going - don’t even get me started on bundlers. You’re probably right - the language probably still isn’t as big as C++. But it’s big enough that almost nobody knows every javascript feature. I was around in the early days of nodejs (0.4 was my first version). At the time the design of the language, and of nodejs, seemed simple, clear and cohesive. Don’t get me wrong - I love a lot of the newer features. But javascript as a language feels like a bit of a bloated mess.
> There are far more ways to write javascript than any of us want.
Some of the examples you cite are due to JavaScript being minimalist though. For object creation there are a few different syntactic methods but it is straightforward how they compare semantically - they are basically equivalent. C++ has numerous methods to do similar things but they each have their own numerous rules and exceptions. Ironically in C++ there is often only one way to do something a certain way, as a similar syntax for initialization may (not will) do something completely different depending on external context - such as merely putting parens around a set of braces.
The diagnostic output of the compilers alone when you misplace a symbol is longer than many JavaScript libraries.
> But it’s big enough that almost nobody knows every javascript feature.
I don’t think this is true. It just isn’t that big of a language. The examples given certainly don’t paint a picture of immense complexity - a few things have accreted during the years, it’s not outside of simply just learning them in a few weeks.
It’s not just about the length of the spec (which is much shorter) but the complexity of those specified features within the system as a whole - JS as a system just isn’t relatively that complex.
> the language probably still isn’t as big as C++.
For anybody that does modern C++ and JavaScript professionally (as opposed to those that are content continuing to write C++ like it’s CFront) this is a coffee spitting understatement.