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by oneeyedpigeon 4627 days ago
The ability to be lazy.
1 comments

Doesn't seem like a good reason for a spec. Laziness is partly why Javascript as a language is so messed up.
If I could down-vote this lazy, drive-by, language bashing I would. Back up 'so messed up' or keep comments like this to yourself, they don't help the discussion.
It is a terrible language, though. That's common knowledge.

It is, however, wrong to say it's terrible because of laziness.

I really don't think it's fair to say it's a terrible language. It does have some terrible, horrible parts. But it also has some wonderful, awe-inspiring, mind-blowing parts. It's just not a MOR language - you have extreme lows and awesome highs.
I would say that Javascript is not too bad a language because it has those nice parts. But overall, it's still a language that feels weird given all the bad parts.

I still don't get around how `this` can be so broken.

"wonderful, awe-inspiring, mind-blowing parts"

Honest question: Such as?

closures, prototypical inheritance, the syntax for object/array literals. and I know it's not strictly part of the language, and it's deeply unfashionable to say so, but I'm quite a fan of the DOM, too.
LOL! Obviously I struck a nerve. I thought it was obvious to everyone the problems of Javascript as a language. For laziness, how about weak typing and defining a class using a function. Plenty more examples, but you can do your own research if you are curious. BTW I like and use Javascript, but it is still a crap language.