| I think the larger issue is that shell scripts are intrinsically bad for writing readable code. Consider the "cut" line in the shell script vs the "map" line in the JS script. The map line is easy to understand because it uses a chain of simple functions (map, split, array access, and lastly trim). The "cut" line has to cram all of this functionality into a few command line arguments instead of composing basic building blocks together. I mean look at this: What does "only delimited" mean, what does "fields" mean, I might just be an illiterate boor but I don't remember what delimiter means off the top of my head (something like seperator, I assume). cut --only-delimited --fields 2 --delimiter '|' The JavaScript version is easier to read because it uses fundamental building blocks in the language that are 1. Super intuitive. (Split seems pretty easy to understand, especially when you know the input is a string, similarly everyone knows [1] means array access). 2. Widespread. You have probably encountered all of those JS functions before, I'd say the chance of encountering the "cut" utility is a bit less. Summary: Shell just fundamentally sucks because it outsources a lot of functionality to various executables, each which have their own command line arguments. The ideal method is to use a programming language with consistent, composable, building blocks. |