Nannying (was: Array comprehension syntax)

[Jason Orendorff]

On Wed, Sep 26, 2012 at 8:22 AM, Andreas Rossberg <rossberg at google.com> wrote:
>> Separate question to you: (for|let|if)+ is what Jason championed, are you on
>> board?
>
> Right, I see no reason to artificially restrict the syntax to specific
> cases, especially given that it wouldn't make the expansion any
> simpler. So I also favour (for|if)+ or (for|let|if)+ (having let makes
> sense, although it probably isn't super important).

It isn't really. The sort of code where you want it is like:

    [x for e of elements
           let x = get_some_data_out_of(e)
               if x]

It doesn't come up very often, but when it does, if you can't use let,
the workarounds are things like:

    // use "for-of" to mean "let"
    [x for e of elements
           for x of [get_some_data_out_of(e)]   // ಠ_ಠ
               if x]

    // go ahead and repeat yourself
    [get_some_data_out_of(e) for e of elements
                                 if get_some_data_out_of(e)]  // ಠ益ಠ

    // declare a temp variable, assign in the if-condition
    var x;
    [x for e of elements
           if x = get_some_data_out_of(e)]   // (ಥ﹏ಥ)

    // use "for-of" to mean "let" in a different way
    [x for x of [get_some_data_out_of(e) for e of elements]
           if x]  // ⊙﹏⊙

The main drawback of comprehensions is the temptation to get "clever".
It might seem that providing 'let' in comprehensions would exacerbate
that, but on balance I think it actually helps.

-j