Class Syntax Proposal, Complete With Arguments For and Examples.

[Jonathan Dumaine]

Hello Mark,

I think mistake is a harsh word. It is really a question of how much the
community wants javascript to adopt object-oriented paradigms. You could go
all the way and make classes a very strict subset of the language: throw an
error if the user tries to set a property of a class instance that has
already been declared private. Or, on the complete opposite side of the
spectrum: setting the property on an instance overwrite it, just like it
would if the class instance was a normal object.

I would personally prefer the prior route: sacrifice some of javascript's
dynamic attributes in favor of better abstraction and encapsulation
capabilities. Of course, we're only talking about class instances here, so I
think that's a very small sacrifice to be made.


Perhaps you could direct me to the discussion the committee has already had
on this matter so I could better form my arguments?



Jonathan Dumaine
+1 50.55.10.11.12


On Sat, Sep 17, 2011 at 3:37 PM, Mark S. Miller <erights at google.com> wrote:

> Hi Jonathan,
>
> Your class recapitulates a mistake the committee almost made as well. Your
> private and public member are in the same namespace. Private members should
> not affect the behavior of the public API. However, if a class makes an
> extensible instance, and a client of the instance tries to add an "_x"
> expando property to that instance, where that happens to conflict with one
> of that abstraction's private names, what should happen?
>
> --
>   Cheers,
>   --MarkM
>
>
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