Hacker News Reader

Comment by oinksoft | Hacker News Reader

Sometimes I think that most CoffeeScript, ClojureScript, etc. programmers are people who were advanced in other languages before they learned JavaScript. There are quite a few programmers who have no issues with these "bad parts" or "really bad parts" because they cut their teeth on them, and these numbers are growing: Most people now learn JavaScript as their first language. JavaScript already won, and things like CoffeeScript are the last gasp of the old regime.

View on HN

as someone who coded JS all through the 00 years and still remember the times when we welcomed prototype.js as fresh air and the struggle that was JS coding then - so basically i think i'm the ancient regime - i have to say: no

CS is not the silver bullet - but neither is blind believe that vanilla JS is the best way to code for the web. things change. technology runs in (hype)circles: we welcome the new stuff (i.e. languages), only we see the benefits of the old way, and then we still create new stuff...

As someone from the old regime (cut my teeth on spectrum basic in the 80's, get of my lawn etc etc) I sorta agree.

For years I avoided using javascript beyond wiring little bits of jQuery together because I hated the language but eventually I ran into a project where I could no longer do that and resolved to learn javascript properly.

Many wtf's where had but now looking back I realise that Javascript is a warty language (but then show me a widely used (top 10) language that isn't).

I still don't like it but I don't hate it and I just accept it for what it is.

To an extent it is a Devil you know/Devil you don't thing. The moment one of the JS-first people get bitten by the CoffeeScript compiler (having to indent/dedent something, move a comma, suddenly your code is working ... I think everybody runs into the sort of issues the author described) they are going to go back to JS. JS is such a high-level language already, and the browser vendors and SSJS projects seem focused on advancing it. I just don't see much room in the future for languages like CS.

I agree the other issue with someone like me using CoffeeScript is that first I'd want to really understand Javascript otherwise I'd never be able to trust that I could fix any bugs I ran across, it's another layer of abstraction I essentially don't need.

I disagree with this. This implies that you always view your first language through rose colored glasses. I don't think this is the case. Anectodally, I learned C first and still use it to this day, but I can certainly tell you where its flaws are and when I would and would not use it.

Yes, a beginner might not see the flaws of Javascript up front, but given enough time to become an expert, they certainly will.

Your argument is that because programmers who learned JavaScript first "have no issues" with the "bad parts" or "really bad parts" that means they aren't really issues, or that we should ignore the issues and adopt JavaScript anyway because we don't want people to think that we are old?

Exactly this. I used CoffeeScript when I had hard time understanding JavaScript. Once you truly gasp JavaScript, anything else will just look like a waste of time.

I have a hard time seeing someone who has actually spent some time with Clojurescript making that statement.

That statement has nothing to do with personal experience, and everything to do with unmistakable trends in software development. If JavaScript were a frozen language I would agree with you, but the momentum behind JS is a tsunami.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com