TIScript vs JavaScript.Harmony (ECMAScript 6), Part I

Variables, block scope

As we know local variables in JavaScript are declared in function scope. That creates many problems and surprises for people who came to JS from other languages using the same Java/C/C++ notation.

Consider sample that follows. Here we create array of 10 functions, each of them shall return idx value it was created with.

var farr = [];
for(var i = 0; i < 10; ++i) {
  var idx = i; 
  farr[idx] = function() { return idx; }
}

If you call functions from the farr array in JavaScript you will get these results:

console.log( farr[5]() ); // -> 9
console.log( farr[2]() ); // -> 9

Surprise? I think so.

And if you run the same code in TIScript you will get results you expect:

stdout.println( farr[5]() ); // -> 5
stdout.println( farr[2]() ); // -> 2

That’s because TIScript uses block scope – all variables declared inside some block { ... } are local to that block.

To "fix" that initial design mistake (IMO) authors of ECMAScript.6 introduced new keyword let that allows to define variables in block scope, so for that sample to work properly you will do this:

var farr = [];
for(var i = 0; i < 10; ++i) {
  let idx = i; // note the 'let' here. idx is in block scope now. 
  farr[idx] = function() { return idx; }
}

Not that perfect of course but at least something.

Constants

TIScript from the beginning supported const keyword – declaration of read only variables:

const mask = "*.tis";

Any attempt to change value of the mask generates an error in TIScript: for local constants – at compile time and for global constants – at runtime.

In JavaScript ‘const’ is introduced in ECMAScript.6 with exactly same meaning.

Default parameters

From the very beginning TIScript supports definition of default values of function parameters:

function person( name = "anonymous", age = null ) {
   return { name: name, 
            age:age };
}

We can call such function without any parameters:

var p = person(); // p.name ->  "anonymous", p.age -> null

ECMAScript.6 introduces exactly the same feature – parameters may have default values in JavaScript when browsers will catch up ECMAScript.6.

Rest parameters

In TIScript when you define function as this:

function foo( a, b, r.. ) { stdout.println(a,b,r) }

and call it as:

foo( 1,2,3,4 );

The r variable will be set to an array [3,4] and a and b will get 1 and 2 values correspondingly.

ECMAScript.6 uses slightly different syntax for the same feature:

function foo( a, b, ...r ) { console.log(a,b,r) } 

Array comprehensions

ECMAScript.6 officially introduces feature named "array comprehensions" – mechanism that allows to declare/initialize arrays using kinda declarative syntax. Array comprehensions came to JS from Python I believe. While in Python notation they probably look OK but in JS syntax the comprehensions are not readable most of the time.

Let’s say we have an array:

var numbers = [1, 2, 3, 21, 22, 30];

and we want to create another array that will have only even numbers. With the comprehensions we can define it as:

var evens = [i for (i of numbers) if (i % 2 === 0)]; 

Not quite readable in my opinion.

In TIScript I would write it as:

var evens = numbers.filter( :i: i % 2 === 0 );

– shorter and so more readable.

TIScript has no array comprehensions at the moment and probably will not have them until I’ll see really good use of them.