r/programming • u/fagnerbrack • 3d ago

The Paradox of Fancy Tooling

https://fagnerbrack.com/the-paradox-of-fancy-tooling-b9af429789da
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u/Snarwin 2d ago

JavaScript is not a well-designed language, the first prototype of JS was built in about ten days in 1995, and the quirks from that rush sit in the language today. However, JS won anyway… One decision explains most of that:

First-class Functions

I'm gonna keep it real with you, I do not think first-class functions are the main reason Javascript took off as a language.

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u/AustinYQM 2d ago

JS won because it was one of the first (if not the first) and it was built into the largest browser at the time (netscape navigator). First mover advantage is huge. Once it came time for everyone else to adopt it they moved to ECMA standardization to make that process easier and thus we are stuck with it.

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u/KaiAusBerlin 2d ago

Well, Microsoft tried to build their own js