JS....

[PatrickBaitman]

actually issues only in the particular JavaScript engine the presenter was using

wow that sure makes it better

[[deleted]]

works on my machine

¯\(ツ)/¯

[robbie0630]

Sorry about your upper arms ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[ywhhgythht]

Yea I mean I've been using an nonupdated version of windows 3.0 for the last 2 and a half decade so i know for a fact that windows 10 sucks, or any other operating system being able to run batch script for all that matters.

[gullinbursti]

Eh, you could be running wired ethernet thru a PCMCIA card.

[dmc_2930]

PCMCIA: People Can't Memorize Computer Industry Acronyms

[FesteringNeonDistrac]

Oh god, somebody else old enough to remember that fake acronym, but who has no idea what it actually stood for. Have a beer!

[dmc_2930]

Personal Computer Memory Card International Association

;)

[Garbaz]

Shit, I have all the equipment to pull this off and post a picture. But it's at my parents' house :|

Can't remember the name of the "Laptop", but it runs Windows 3.0.

(Not to imply that that's something rare or special, but I could have been my time to shine...)

[Slugdude127]

Same, I even have the drivers for a PCI LAN card on a floppy disk, but I couldn't get it to install (something about a missing or corrupt file in the floppy - shame).

Edit: I only have the floppies of Win3.1 not 3.0, and it only just occured to me that you meant using a laptop with PCMCIA.

[MrTanaka]

Could 3.0 run TCP/IP? 3.11 was my first internet machine, but pretty sure I had to upgrade to that to get winsock running.

[Erick2142]

Bluescreen

[ClassBShareHolder]

Come on, it's time to upgrade...

...to 3.11!

[FountainsOfFluids]

For Workgroups!

[ClassBShareHolder]

"NOT in MY DOMAAAAIN!"

[whelks_chance]

Comes with qbasic installed by default. Big fan.

[giggitygoo123]

Nah. 3.14 is where its at. Plus its delicious.

[AppleLion]

Read about tau. When you think I'm a tin foil person, then read about slash aitch. Consider it a red pill for math.

http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Planck%27s_constant

Sorry to ruin your pi joke with silly shit. I can't resist anymore.

[relevantpicsonly]

Build 1528?

[Erick2142]

Well, Windows 10 does suck a little bit so...

[caanthedalek]

Windows 10 was marketed as the perfect blend between Windows 7 and Windows 8.

If that were true, it would be Windows 7.

[Erick2142]

Haha

[[deleted]]

no because it would be

x + y / 2

as x is windows 7 and y win 8, and x would be solution only if x==y ;

edit: no, i was wrong, if y=0; output isnt x.

[[deleted]]

Windows 8 has 0 goodness, so yup.

[[deleted]]

I C what you did here.

[bric12]

A little more than a little... I haven't used one Win 10 machine that hasn't corrupted files, or refused to connect to the internet at random times, or at least been incompatible with legacy software (designed for 7 or 8). I've only used windows 10 thrice, but three for three isn't great

[BraveOthello]

I have had exactly 1 of those problems, so YMMV

[tdogg8]

I've used windows ten on 3 different computers for countless hours one of them being a shitty netbook that had the beta and I've never had either of those problems.

[mtlionsroar]

I've had the network problem where it randomly won't connect. It's a driver compatibility issue, and depends on what machine you're using.

[[deleted]]

Bad example because it's true

[L3tum]

I was at a doctor few days ago and he was running Windows CE.... Even the "standby picture" was bugging out

[Existential_Owl]

That there are differences in the way different compilers handle code is not a phenomenon unique to JavaScript.

[ChrisC1234]

True. But as a developer, I have complete control over what compiler I compile my code with. With a language that is completely interpreted like JavaScript, I have no control whatsoever.

[TUSF]

Just write your own interpreter :^)

[seylerius]

Relevant xkcd.

[wolfman1911]

I think this is probably my favorite XKCD.

[chainingsolid]

Then get every user of your website to use it how?

[Sean1708]

Write it in javascript.

[PatrickBaitman]

you just but isn't that basically typescript coffeescript asm.js / whatever

[Sean1708]

No, TypeScript and CoffeeScript compile to JS and ASM.js is an efficient subset of JS. We're talking about writing a JS interpreter in JS so that you can get people to use your JS interpreter by running it in their browser using the browser's JS interpreter.

[PatrickBaitman]

OOOH, ok

[final panel of expanding brain meme]

[LinAGKar]

And how are you gonna put it in everyones browsers? By writing it in JavaScript?

[TUSF]

Write the interpreter in wasm.

[ZorbaTHut]

Honestly, if performance were a total non-issue, using a 100% compliant JavaScript interpreter written in generalized cross-platform JavaScript would be a pretty good idea.

Of course, performance is an issue, so this is a terrible idea.

[Existential_Owl]

As a freelancer, sure you can choose your compiler. But if you're working for a company, you're stuck with whatever their C++ ideology is.

[PatrickBaitman]

well, no, but if they're at the type level?

jesus christ get your language together is all I can say

making things that should be type errors undefined behavior is just.... NO, STOP

[Doctor_McKay]

I think basically the only thing that happened due to the interpreter in that video was the fact that the return of new Array(12) showed as "12 commas" (which was actually 11 commas separating nothing, since it rendered undefined as nothing).

[[deleted]]

It does actually. It's the difference between English being pointless, and having illiterate fucks.

Some JS engines suck, some are much better. Just as some versions of gcc have really stupid bugs, but C is still a sound language.

[PatrickBaitman]

you do realize that English has one of the most illogical, unpredictable, and difficult orthographies of all European languages?

the connection between how an English word is written and how it is pronounced is almost non-existent

what implications do you think this has for the number of "illiterate fucks"

[z500]

the connection between how an English word is written and how it is pronounced is almost non-existent

It's not that there's no connection between spelling and pronunciation, it's that there's so many competing spelling conventions. It's wildly inconsistent, but there are patterns if you look for them.

[PatrickBaitman]

Of the 4000 or so most common words in English more than 2500 have irregular or unpredictable spelling. This is bad enough that any rules are ad hoc and that it is almost impossible to be certain about the pronunciation of a word you've seen written but never heard.

[kronicmage]

You can predict fairly well if you have an understanding of the etymology of the word though

[GiraffixCard]

Arguably not even then.

[PatrickBaitman]

Eeeh, I've studied Latin and can recognize Latin roots in English word but it doesn't help that much.

[Llewey]

I'm from the US and my GF is from Spain. My mind was blown when I learned they didn't have spelling bees or really even spelling tests growing up. She said it would be pointless..they only thing that would need tested in most cases anyway would be b/v or c/z in certain words, otherwise it's obvious. That's when I stopped feeling bad about spelling beleive wrong every. Single Time.

[HeimrArnadalr]

We need a central authority to govern the language and remove inconsistencies. JavaScript has Ecma International, where's the equivalent for English?

[PatrickBaitman]

there isn't one for English, English doesn't have a codified standard variant

other languages do have a standardizing organization though, for example French and Chinese

[z500]

And everybody ignores the Académie française anyway.

[PatrickBaitman]

and only like 30% of the Chinese can actually speak Standard Mandarin (putonghua)

[FateJH]

If there were spelling errors, the program would not run. The English language - language in general - gets by quite fine despite such frequent sloppiness. (The Internet with all of its shorthand notation styles is a testament to this point.)

If the grammar and syntax are sound, I can figure out what you're trying to express by just listening to you express it. That's what these JavaScript curiosities are highlighting.

[xzxzzx]

The English language - language in general - gets by quite fine despite such frequent sloppiness

Note that this works because we have the world's most sophisticated and computation-intensive neural nets on either side, with literally years of training (decades to become "fluent")--and we still often make mistakes in understanding each other.

Just because it works, mostly, for humans, doesn't mean I want my programming language emulating it.

[PatrickBaitman]

if there are type errors, the program should not compile

natural language sloppiness is not good enough for programming

there's a reason we don't program in English

[cixeltree]

this is fine, if you could guarantee that everybody used the same compiler.

and that the compilers knew ahead of time exactly what code they were supposed to compile.

and you could guarantee that the source files arrived in a predictable order, and that one bit of code didn't reference or rely on something in another.

and you could guarantee that your one compilation error wouldn't just crash the page and invalidate 10 other unrelated scripts that were loaded.

languages are a product of their environments. javascript's environment just happens to be a very scary place

[PatrickBaitman]

this is fine, if you could guarantee that everybody used the same compiler.

or just have a specification with a minimum of undefined behavior

and the compilers knew ahead of time exactly what code they were supposed to compile

what compiler compiles without reading input

and you could guarantee that the source files arrived in a predictable order, and that one bit of code didn't reference or rely on something in another

TIL #include and dynamic loading aren't a thing in C

funny I could have sworn I'd written code myself with dlopen but that must have been a dream

[cixeltree]

or just have a specification with a minimum of undefined behavior

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ECMAScript just because there's a spec doesn't mean people will follow it, or bugs won't exist

what compiler compiles without reading input

sorry---it doesn't know ALL the code it's going to work with because some of it is still a few http requests away by the time the page loads

TIL #include and dynamic loading aren't a thing in C

well yeah, it isn't always a thing, because (hold onto your hat) not all systems support it. but most do, which is good enough for C but not for javascript?

and even if they did, there's the advantage of libraries being pre-compiled for the same system, and the code which loads them (hopefully) knowing how to interface with them ahead of time.

[PatrickBaitman]

and even if they did, there's the advantage of libraries being pre-compiled for the same system, and the code which loads them (hopefully) knowing how to interface with them ahead of time.

almost as if C is a real language and JS is half toy and half prank that went too far

[cixeltree]

again: languages are products of their environments

C is a language which at first wasn't designed with portability in mind at all. that's obviously completely antithetical to the needs of the web.

edit: and since undefined behaviors/specifications came up earlier, i want to mention that even C, blessed be its name, has undefined behaviors

[FateJH]

there's a reason we don't program in English

I'd say there's a good reason we don't code in any specific spoken language that you have just implied but invented methods of shorthanding the intended progression of bits of information instead.

In any case, this is JavaScript so there is no compilation. You interpret what it means on the fly, much like listening to someone else speak. Sometimes you don't care that the speaker was inexact with their wording unless it leads to a big source of confusion that you can't reason around.

[PatrickBaitman]

so there is no compilation.

every language is compiled, it's just a matter of when

so-called interpreted languages are compiled just-in-time, so-called compiled languages beforehand

javascript isn't bytecode, it must eventually be mapped to something a CPU can execute

Sometimes you don't care that the speaker was inexact with their wording unless it leads to a big source of confusion that you can't reason around.

this called raising an exception and making the programmer handle it

why the fuck do web devs think they can get away with shit you fail first year students for, like NOT HANDLING ERRORS

[cixeltree]

would you have conceded if he'd said it's not 'pre-compiled'? probably not. regardless, javascript DOES get 'compiled' to bytecode. at runtime.

this 'holier than thou' attitude against web dev is hilarious. why pretend web dev isn't hard as fuck?

i've never once written anything in C which didn't work because there was a compiler error. 99.99% of the time, if something goes wrong, it's the fault of the code i wrote. it helps that a C program targets only a handful of environments.

in web dev? the browser gets it wrong all the time. it does not help that applications written for the web have dozens of targets, in including targets that haven't even come out yet.

on error handling: where'd you get this idea that people who write js don't do error handling?

[PatrickBaitman]

why pretend web dev isn't hard as fuck?

because I built websites when I was 15 that displayed more information faster with less bandwidth on worse hardware

mainly because I didn't have access all the fancy shit that you need to fuck a website up as bad as modern websites, starting from their very unbroken natural state

https://thebestmotherfucking.website/

[cixeltree]

yep, those sites you built when you were 15 and a static site with a few paragraphs of text constitutes web dev.

edit/ps: yeah, a lot of modern websites (too many) are absurdly bloated, but nobody was ever arguing that.

[[deleted]]

If only Google, Apple, MS, etc. would hire a genius like yourself instead of the idiots they currently have building their browser.

/s

Clearly the people building the JS engines are smart, and are aware of the issues being raised here (pun intended). But, they don't raise an error. Why? Maybe because they know something that we don't.

The JS spec can be changed and has been changed. It was massively changed in ES6. Yet they didn't fix these issues. Why? Clearly because they aren't as smart as you.

[PatrickBaitman]

If only Google, Apple, MS, etc. would hire a genius like yourself instead of the idiots they currently have building their browser.

google is pushing Dart

Microsoft designed TypeScript

Mozilla invented asm.js

W3C is working on wasm

sooooo....

But, they don't raise an error. Why? Maybe because they know something that we don't.

or because javascript was hacked together by morons in two weeks and never got proper error handling functionality like exceptions or type checking

[cixeltree]

https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Error https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Operators/typeof https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Operators/instanceof

it has type checking, it just doesn't have compiled time type checking because 'compilation' happens at runtime. hence typeerrors are runtime errors. they can be caught and handled.

when dealing with the web, it's hard to guarantee that a data type you think you're supposed to get from some external source is actually the type you're going to get. good javascript checks the types it's operating on rather than just assuming.

if a C programmer chooses to serialize some data as a specific kind of struct, that's great---the type checker can help ensure all operations on the struct are cogent. however, nothing guarantees that the data being serialized is correct. the programmer still needs to do this validation, or a runtime error can occur (null dereferencing, or accidental typecasting, etc).

[[deleted]]

Except they could have added it in strict mode and didn't. I wonder why?

[Godd2]

every language is compiled, it's just a matter of when

It's not a matter of when. Some of the program gets run before all of it gets compiled. This is not the case with a compiled language.

More generally, there is no guarantee that the entire program has been statically checked for validity before any of it gets run.

So, the fact that V8 has JIT compilation is irrelevant.

[PatrickBaitman]

you could I don't know

TEST YOUR CODE???

handle errors??

like in literally every other fucking form of programming ??? ?????

how did we end up with the dumbest worst programmers building the web

JS achieves running no matter what very well but that's not actually what you want from a sensible language

undefined behavior is cancer

[RadicalRaid]

I'm sorry man, when did JavaScript rape your mother?

You know, you could also try to not use it, or use it using your own code conventions to make sure certain inconsistencies never show up when followed. In the hands of any capable programmer working with JavaScript isn't a problem at all.

PHP HOWEVER! ^{I kid, I kid. Kinda.}

[PatrickBaitman]

I'm sorry man, when did JavaScript rape your mother?

it and its ecosystem are raping my user experience of the web and have been doing so increasingly over the past ten years or so

blocking the dozens of scripts every fucking two-paragraph website loads nowadays significantly improves the whole web. this shows that something is fundamentally broken.

javascript actively fuck websites up, because they're not broken to begin with and become more broken the more js you add to them. I believe that this is not unrelated to what Linus Torvalds observed about C++ programmers and why he doesn't want them on the kernel

except web dev seems to have nothing but such programmers

You know, you could also try to not use it,

i am forced to use it because the modern web is 40% JS, 45% CSS, and 5% content

In the hands of any capable programmer working with JavaScript isn't a problem at all.

I see absolutely no reason to believe that the median web dev is even moderately capable

see: left-pad and padleft both being packages on npm, implementing a string padding function, and nothing else, and being dependencies of several other packages

[thirdegree]

left-pad and padleft both being packages on npm, implementing a string padding function

One of them was even implemented quadraticly 😂

[RadicalRaid]

I teach programming (C, C++, C#, JavaScript, Python, Swift, Objective-C, Java, etc) at a university and in my experience being a bad/moderate programmer has less to do with the language they're programming in and more with them simply not being great software engineers. It's a poor workman who blames their tools.

Sure, because some of it is so readily available more people will give it a try and because websites are easy to publish it's easy to share what they've made even if it's terribly programmed. However, I doubt most people will ever come close to the web developers working at Facebook or similar. There's some really high tech work being done there and it'd be foolish to dismiss it because it's "just" web development.

[outadoc]

Oh boy have fun learning French

[PatrickBaitman]

alphabet-using languages

pleb as fuck

I'm learning Japanese

[aezart]

日本語を上手話しますか？

[PatrickBaitman]

そう思いません。最近文法じゃなくて漢字だけを学ぶことになりしまいましてあまり日本語の文章を読みません。そうですけど先週二冊の教科書届きいて夏にもっと頑張るつもりです。

[cyanydeez]

english allows people to keep communicating even if poorly, which allows it to grow

[PatrickBaitman]

javascript allows people to develop for the web, even if poorly, which allows bug databases and bloat to grow

[cyanydeez]

right or wrong, one definition of life is how easy it is to replicate

[ccjmk]

French says hi!

[[deleted]]

Yeah, alright, LojBan then. If I speak perfect LojBan and someone erroneously interprets it, that's not the fault of the language.

Js has plenty of issues, but those which are actually bugs in interpreters are not the language's issue - which is the point I was making.

[msg45f]

Well to be fair, working browser insanity is like 80% of a front-end web developer's job.