ES3.1 Object static methods rationale document

[Brendan Eich]

On Jul 15, 2008, at 10:30 PM, Allen Wirfs-Brock wrote:

> I’ve up loaded to the wiki a new document titled:  “Proposed  
> ECMAScript 3.1 Static Object Functions: Use Cases and Rationale”
>
> It’s available as both a pdf and as a Word doc file:
>
> http://wiki.ecmascript.org/lib/exe/fetch.php?id=es3.1% 
> 3Aes3.1_proposal_working_draft&cache=cache&media=es3.1:rationale_for_e 
> s3_1_static_object_methods.pdf
>
> http://wiki.ecmascript.org/lib/exe/fetch.php?id=es3.1% 
> 3Aes3.1_proposal_working_draft&cache=cache&media=es3.1:rationale_for_e 
> s3_1_static_object_methods.doc
>

Hi Allen,

Good to see rationales. A few comments:

* No rationale responding to the thread containing this message:

https://mail.mozilla.org/pipermail/es4-discuss/2007-September/ 
001114.html

that questions the wisdom of getPrototypeOf. The other rationales are  
helpful, the lack of one responding to this public thread questioning  
essentially the same design element is a lack -- what do you think?

* getProperty and getProperties seem misnamed in light of common  
usage of "get", "[[Get]]", "getProperty", etc. all connoting value- 
getting, not descriptor-getting. getPropertyDescriptor is a bit long,  
but not fatally so. Worth renaming?

* Did you consider prototype's Object.extend method:

Object.extend = function(destination, source) {
   for (var property in source)
     destination[property] = source[property];
   return destination;
};

(see http://www.prototypejs.org/assets/2007/11/6/prototype.js)? It's  
a commonly encountered "shallow enumerable property clone". John  
Resig enquired about it being in ES3.1 drafts, but it's not there.  
Any particular reason why not?

/be


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