Comments on Skuunk: jQuery: When does a library become a language?

Well, creating successives layers of languages is ...

2009-04-20T22:23:00.000-07:00

Well, creating successives layers of languages is a way well known in the functional paradigm to improve the core of a language. The capacity of javascript to handle funtions as high-level "objects" and handle code as data and viceversa let the creation of a new "language" layer (or various) on top of the core language. This approximation is in the 1992 book on lisp of paul graham for example. ops, but where is macros??? :-P

Remember one of the biggest virtues of JavaScript ...

2009-04-20T14:02:00.000-07:00

Remember one of the biggest virtues of JavaScript is being "Prototype Based" and that give you a lot of "Beautiful Power". That's impossible or very hard to implement in other languages.

(For getting more familiar with "Prototype Based" programming or enjoying more of it make sure to check out iolanguage.com)

@Anonymous -- When Joao said Ruby was based on C, ...

2009-04-20T11:59:00.000-07:00

@Anonymous -- When Joao said Ruby was based on C, I suspect the reference was to the Ruby interpreter/VM are built in C, at least Matz's versions (Rubinius being based on C++).

Regarding Joao's assertion that "Ruby is actually ...

2009-04-20T07:38:00.000-07:00

Regarding Joao's assertion that "Ruby is actually based on C. JavaScript is more usually based on C++ ..."

I'd say Ruby is strongly influence by Perl's loose syntax and Smalltalk's object system, and JavaScript is actually closer to Scheme than C++.

For what it's worth, on the "compiled vs interpret...

2009-04-20T05:13:00.000-07:00

For what it's worth, on the "compiled vs interpreted" comparison, Perl and Java are pretty much the same. They both compile their source code to byte code, then run the byte code on a virtual machine. They both inherit this approach from Pascal.

The difference is that Perl's compiler is much faster; so fast that it's generally not worth running it as a separate step. That's why most people don't realize it's there. The speed and compile-at-run-time behavior gives Perl programmers most of the development efficiency of an interpreted language, and also most of the run-time speed and efficiency of a compiled language.

It might be interesting to notice that the origina...

2009-04-20T01:42:00.000-07:00

It might be interesting to notice that the original Javascript inplementation was written in Lisp.

You might then consider exploring a bit more the "lambda calculus side" of Javascript and find that, in fact, jQuery functional style isn't that "different" at all.

Hello there! Ruby is actually based on C. JavaSc...

2009-04-20T00:10:00.000-07:00

Hello there!

Ruby is actually based on C.

JavaScript is more usually based on C++ and I really like what the Google guys have created in their v8 JavaScript engine.

jQuery is impressive for the author really kept focused on reusing the approach for all of its tasks, but when I tried to read its code I found it quite tough, just as tough as when trying to read people's jQuery plugins, each saving data differently and trying too much to keep the conciseness. ;-)

Prototype and all other libraries work quite differently to jQuery and it seems as if the development of Prototype has stalled as of late even though it also means that it does not introduce changes that could break people's code. jQuery's popularity is very impressive and deserved!

Tools such as jQuery can be much more easily built using languages that allow more creative liberty. jQuery's success is a clue to why people seek much higher level languages than they usually get when using C, C++, Java and so on. And just as jQuery doesn't cease functioning despite all kinds of developments, just so do the tools that are built in these extremely higher level languages like Ruby and so on. Just as jQuery helps with really exercising the browsers' capabilities, tools built for instance in Ruby also really help with fixing bugs and improving the quality of the underlying platform.

There is a lot of work to make such a magic work, to make languages a success, and the roles of the libraries is to facilitate some kind of programming and not to become entire languages themselves. ;-) In Ruby, mini-languages called Domain Specific Languages of which jQuery is an example are very popular. DSLs in Ruby really push the envelope and might even scare guys like the creator of Ruby, matz, who might not like everything that he sees when users allow their creativity to flourish.

Cheers.