Skip to content

Instantly share code, notes, and snippets.

View allenwb's full-sized avatar

Allen Wirfs-Brock allenwb

View GitHub Profile
@allenwb
allenwb / enumerate.js
Created July 18, 2014 00:05
[[Enumerate]] in JS code
function *enumerate(obj) {
if (Object(obj)!==obj) return undefined;
let visited = new Set;
while (obj!==null ) {
for (name of Object.getOwnPropertyNames(obj)) {
if (!visited.has(name)) {
let desc = Object.getOwnPropertyDescriptor(obj,name);
if (desc) {
visited.add(name);
if (desc.enumerable) yield name;
@allenwb
allenwb / 0option1ConstructorSummary.md
Last active August 29, 2015 14:04
New ES6 constructor features and semantics: Alternative 1 auto allocation in derived classes

New ES6 Constructor Semantics and Usage Examples

Auto super: Alternative Design where subclass constructors automatically call their superclass constructors

This Gist presents a new design of class-based object construction in ES6 that does not require use of the two-phase @@create protocol.

One of the characteristics of this proposal is that subclasses constructors automatically super invoke their superclass constructor's object allocation and initialization logic unless the derived constructor expliictly assigns to this.

An alternative version of this proposal eliminates from the design most implicit/automatic invocations of superclass constructors.

In addition to the material below, there is a seperate design rationale covering several key features that are common to both designs.

@allenwb
allenwb / 0Option2ConstructorSummary.md
Last active November 4, 2023 14:39
New ES6 constructor features and semantics: Alternative 2 manual super in derived classes

New ES6 Constructor Semantics and Usage Examples

Manual super: Alternative Design where subclass constructors do not automatically call superclass constructors

This Gist presents a new design of class-based object construction in ES6 that does not require use of the two-phase @@create protocol.

One of the characteristics of this proposal is that subclass constructors must explicitly super invoke their superclass's constructor if they wish to use the base class' object allocation and initialization logic.

An alternative version of this design automatically invokes the base constructor in most situations.

At the July 2014 TC39 meeting, we presented a sketch of a new object instantiation design that was inspired from posting of Claude Pache. Here's the basic idea, as originally described by Claude:

If a constructor C uses super in its code, let’s say:

  class C extends B {
      constructor(...args) {
          /* 1: preliminary code that doesn't contain calls to a super-method */
          // ...

          /* 2: call to a super-constructor */
@allenwb
allenwb / species.md
Last active November 18, 2015 05:57
A FAQ on the Design of the ECMAScript 2016 @@species protocol

####Why is .constructor not good enough? What does doing .constructor[@@species] add?

@@species is an extension point that allows abstract algorithms that may be inherited by (or applied to) various subclasses with differing characteristics to decouple the class of the objects generated by an application of the method from the actual class of the objects the method was applied to. This is a realivately rare situation, but one that does infact occur when developing relatively complex class hierarchies such as a collections hierarchy.

The first known usage of the species pattern that I’m aware of (and the origin of the name species) was in the Smalltalk-80 collection hierarchy. For example, the Smalltalk-80 collection hierarchy includes a class called SortedCollection. SortedCollection is a subclass of OrderedCollection (essentially a double ended queue, similar to a JS Array) except that whenever a new element is added to the collection, the value ordering of the collection is resorted. The familiar operat