Program configuration [Was: class prototype object vs class instance properties]
We considered using ordinary control flow constructs for program configuration but in the end decided to use a purely attribute based mechanism for that purpose. Given that we were using configuration attributes on definitions and members of object and array literals, extending their use to blocks seemed consistent and natural. Also, we thought giving a compile time meaning to if-else might make programs harder to read. But if you do like Java and limit the feature to compiling out statements, then using if-else syntax might be just fine.
Jd
-----Original Message----- From: P T Withington [mailto:ptw at pobox.com] Sent: Monday, August 20, 2007 11:17 AM To: Jeff Dyer Cc: Brendan Eich; Garrett Smith; es4-discuss at mozilla.org Subject: Program configuration [Was: class prototype object vs class instance properties]
On 2007-08-20, at 13:21 EDT, Jeff Dyer wrote:
ActionScript will have something like this soon in its program configuration feature. It is described here:
On 2007-08-20, at 13:21 EDT, Jeff Dyer wrote:
Interesting that you rejected the use of Javascript control flow for
configuration. That is what we use in LZX. Effectively we just
require that if statements involving configuration variables be
optimized at compile time. (We don't currently permit expressions on
configuration variables and we don't have a language for defining
configuration variables.) The benefit we saw is that the programmer
does not need to learn anything new to understand configuration.