Two facts mentioned in the video that I didn't previously know and make me feel better about JavaScript:
1- JavaScript is lisp in disguise
2- The name JavaScript is an inside joke referencing the language's differences from Java, not its similarities.
That was enough to make me change my mind, and I'm currently enjoying learning JavaScript unashamedly. Browser differences and lack of standards are a PITA, but OTOH, they all have awesome debuggers - HTML+JavaScript may be the only UI toolkit + dev environment that comes packaged with ALL computers, and for that reason has the widest reach.
There's no question that the JS world is a bit wild west compared to other languages, but there's also no question that the situation is getting better over time, and that depending on what you're coding, there are huge advantages to using it.
This is an opinion post, not a statement of fact. There's also no byline on that very hyperbolic and negative opinion post. I don't need to defend JavaScript's Schemeness or Douglas Crockford. (I'm sure Douglas is perfectly capable of doing that by himself.)
The obvious authority argument: Given random dude on the internet (heretofore to be known as "Stuff" in reference to his web site), and the guy who wrote jslint and is currently fixing JavaScript, on the topic of what other languages JavaScript is most like, I will defer to Douglas for now.
First and foremost in the actual reasons "Stuff" is wrong is this claim:
[saying javascript is scheme is] "...a thought-terminating cliché. It carries negative informational content and makes people actually know less about languages than they did before."
I am walking talking evidence that "Stuff" is dead wrong on this point. The idea that JavaScript has the functional language parts that I like in Python and Scheme made me curious about the language, allowed me to drop by preconceptions, and I investigated further and learned more about the language. That may well be the exact intention of Douglas saying JavaScript is Scheme-y, which it turns out, "Stuff" admits to before he gets started. This completely undermines the point that "Stuff" was trying to make here, before he makes it.
Second, "Stuff" capitulates to 1/3 similarity on the number of core Scheme features. Except, as he notes, another several are reasonably there but not up to his snuff. That puts us at more like 1/2 to 2/3. The other third is crap nobody wants in a modern language. "Stuff" is being (admittedly) biased about where he draws the line.
The most telling is that he points right at the things that we all want in a language: minimalism, first class functions, and closures. He comes right out and names all the languages we like and hold up as being "better" than JavaScript. :O There's no better reason to call JavaScript Scheme-y.
This. The great thing about JS, and time has proved this, is just how powerful a concept it was from the start and just how misunderstood it was. Just because people misused the flexibility of the language does not make it a bad one.
As the JS engines in browsers have got better and more "real developers" have come on board the wild west is no longer so wild. The problem I found before was that front-end developers would code JS but they had no formal education in programming, so they couldn't grasp those OO concepts. If you look at some of the libraries and JS code out there now you'd be amazed at the standard of code. Most of it far beyond me now, I haven't coded in JS in some time.
This video changed my mind: http://youtu.be/hQVTIJBZook (google tech talk, "JavaScript: the good parts")
Two facts mentioned in the video that I didn't previously know and make me feel better about JavaScript: 1- JavaScript is lisp in disguise 2- The name JavaScript is an inside joke referencing the language's differences from Java, not its similarities.
That was enough to make me change my mind, and I'm currently enjoying learning JavaScript unashamedly. Browser differences and lack of standards are a PITA, but OTOH, they all have awesome debuggers - HTML+JavaScript may be the only UI toolkit + dev environment that comes packaged with ALL computers, and for that reason has the widest reach.
There's no question that the JS world is a bit wild west compared to other languages, but there's also no question that the situation is getting better over time, and that depending on what you're coding, there are huge advantages to using it.