Why the name 'underscore' or 'lodash'? - node.js

Why are these libraries named after _ ?
Is there some significance behind it or the reason is "Just because we can"?
As far as i know, underscore and lodash do a lot of similar stuff. Also, both the names point to _
Even their variable names are _
So is there some relation of _ with the working of these libraries? Or its just a name?

Lodash
From my understanding of the history of the two, lodash was meant as a lightweight replacement for underscore. So lodash is effectively a play on words on underscore - "low dash", what does a dash - look like when its a bit lower to the ground? _ Why, an underscore of course
So that covers lodash in as much detail as it warrants.
Underscore
Underscore's origin would only be a guess - but a guess I shall make.
"Back in the golden days" of Javascript, when the mighty JQuery reigned supreme, small (at the time) utility libraries started emerging - but one thing we didn't have at the time (or wasn't well known) was simple constructs for import and requiring external libraries.
Very much like JQuery grouping all of its functionality under one giant $ object - underscore (I am guessing) wanted the same. Why? Probably for brevity and that l33t factor. Especially in the days where most people were just including a bunch of script tags in the footer. If you were looking at utility library home page, what appeals to you more:
// totes l33t
_.map(a, function(e) { ... }
// pfft, no thanks grandpa
underscore.map(a, function(e) { ... }
But why _. Well after $ its one of few cool short names left:
An identifier must start with $, _, or any character in the Unicode
categories “Uppercase letter (Lu)”, “Lowercase letter (Ll)”,
“Titlecase letter (Lt)”, “Modifier letter (Lm)”, “Other letter (Lo)”,
or “Letter number (Nl)”.
https://mathiasbynens.be/notes/javascript-identifiers

Related

Meaning of `$` in AJAX functions [duplicate]

The code in question is here:
var $item = $(this).parent().parent().find('input');
What is the purpose of the dollar sign in the variable name, why not just exclude it?
A '$' in a variable means nothing special to the interpreter, much like an underscore.
From what I've seen, many people using jQuery (which is what your example code looks like to me) tend to prefix variables that contain a jQuery object with a $ so that they are easily identified and not mixed up with, say, integers.
The dollar sign function $() in jQuery is a library function that is frequently used, so a short name is desirable.
In your example the $ has no special significance other than being a character of the name.
However, in ECMAScript 6 (ES6) the $ may represent a Template Literal
var user = 'Bob'
console.log(`We love ${user}.`); //Note backticks
// We love Bob.
The dollar sign is treated just like a normal letter or underscore (_). It has no special significance to the interpreter.
Unlike many similar languages, identifiers (such as functional and variable names) in Javascript can contain not only letters, numbers and underscores, but can also contain dollar signs. They are even allowed to start with a dollar sign, or consist only of a dollar sign and nothing else.
Thus, $ is a valid function or variable name in Javascript.
Why would you want a dollar sign in an identifier?
The syntax doesn't really enforce any particular usage of the dollar sign in an identifier, so it's up to you how you wish to use it. In the past, it has often been recommended to start an identifier with a dollar sign only in generated code - that is, code created not by hand but by a code generator.
In your example, however, this doesn't appear to be the case. It looks like someone just put a dollar sign at the start for fun - perhaps they were a PHP programmer who did it out of habit, or something. In PHP, all variable names must have a dollar sign in front of them.
There is another common meaning for a dollar sign in an interpreter nowadays: the jQuery object, whose name only consists of a single dollar sign ($). This is a convention borrowed from earlier Javascript frameworks like Prototype, and if jQuery is used with other such frameworks, there will be a name clash because they will both use the name $ (jQuery can be configured to use a different name for its global object). There is nothing special in Javascript that allows jQuery to use the single dollar sign as its object name; as mentioned above, it's simply just another valid identifier name.
The $ sign is an identifier for variables and functions.
https://web.archive.org/web/20160529121559/http://www.authenticsociety.com/blog/javascript_dollarsign
That has a clear explanation of what the dollar sign is for.
Here's an alternative explanation: http://www.vcarrer.com/2010/10/about-dollar-sign-in-javascript.html
Dollar sign is used in ecmascript 2015-2016 as 'template literals'.
Example:
var a = 5;
var b = 10;
console.log(`Sum is equal: ${a + b}`); // 'Sum is equlat: 15'
Here working example:
https://es6console.com/j3lg8xeo/
Notice this sign " ` ",its not normal quotes.
U can also meet $ while working with library jQuery.
$ sign in Regular Expressions means end of line.
When using jQuery, the usage of $ symbol as a prefix in the variable name is merely by convention; it is completely optional and serves only to indicate that the variable holds a jQuery object, as in your example.
This means that when another jQuery function needs to be called on the object, you wouldn't need to wrap it in $() again. For instance, compare these:
// the usual way
var item = $(this).parent().parent().find('input');
$(item).hide(); // this is a double wrap, but required for code readability
item.hide(); // this works but is very unclear how a jQuery function is getting called on this
// with $ prefix
var $item = $(this).parent().parent().find('input');
$item.hide(); // direct call is clear
$($item).hide(); // this works too, but isn't necessary
With the $ prefix the variables already holding jQuery objects are instantly recognizable and the code more readable, and eliminates double/multiple wrapping with $().
No reason. Maybe the person who coded it came from PHP. It has the same effect as if you had named it "_item" or "item" or "item$$".
As a suffix (like "item$", pronounced "items"), it can signify an observable such as a DOM element as a convention called "Finnish Notation" similar to the Hungarian Notation.
I'll add this:
In chromium browser's developer console (haven't tried others) the $ is a native function that acts just like document.querySelector most likely an alias inspired from JQuery's $
Here is a good short video explanation: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Acm-MD_6934
According to Ecma International Identifier Names are tokens that are interpreted according to the grammar given in the “Identifiers” section of chapter 5 of the Unicode standard, with some small modifications. An Identifier is an IdentifierName that is not a ReservedWord (see 7.6.1). The Unicode identifier grammar is based on both normative and informative character categories specified by the Unicode Standard. The characters in the specified categories in version 3.0 of the Unicode standard must be treated as in those categories by all conforming ECMAScript implementations.this standard specifies specific character additions:
The dollar sign ($) and the underscore (_) are permitted anywhere in an IdentifierName.
Further reading can be found on: http://www.ecma-international.org/ecma-262/5.1/#sec-7.6
Ecma International is an industry association founded in 1961 and dedicated to the standardization of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and Consumer Electronics (CE).
"Using the dollar sign is not very common in JavaScript, but
professional programmers often use it as an alias for the main
function in a JavaScript library.
In the JavaScript library jQuery, for instance, the main function $
is used to select HTML elements. In jQuery $("p"); means "select all
p elements". "
via https://www.w3schools.com/js/js_variables.asp
I might add that using it for jQuery allows you to do things like this, for instance:
$.isArray(myArray);
let $ = "Hello";
let $$ = "World!";
let $$$$$$$$$$$ = $ + " " + $$;
alert($$$$$$$$$$$);
This displays a "Hello World!" alert box.
As you can see, $ is just a normal character as far as JavaScript identifiers or variable names go. In fact you can use a huge range of Unicode characters as variable names that look like dollar or other currency signs!
Just be careful as the $ sign is also used as a reference to the jQuery namespace/library:
$("p").text("I am using some jquery");
// ...is the same as...
jQuery("p").text("I am using some jquery");
$ is also used in the new Template Literal format using string interpolation supported in JavaScript version ES6/2015:
var x = `Hello ${name}`;

Sublime Text 3 custom syntax for cottle: hard to start

I'm trying to make a "very simple" syntax highlight for "cottle" (which is a script language used in a text-to-speech app dedicated to Elite:Dangerous).
All i want (at least at the beginning) is to have three different colours: Comments, "non-strings", and strings.
I started trying with the ST3 wiki, youtube tutorials, questions here.... but i can't sort out how to do it, 'cause the way the language work.
I'll try to show you an example
{ everything_between_a_pair_of_brackets_is_code }
everything outside all pairs of bracket is a string {_ and this is a comment. It begins with "_" and ends at the closing bracket }
{ This_is_code("but this is a string")
This_is_still_code("this is also a string {but_this_is_code(\"and a string\")} and this the end of the string")
}
My problem is how to define this kind of "nidification" in my cottle.sublime-syntax file. I managed to get the comment, but only the first one.
- EDIT -
This is a real script:
{event.item}
{if event.repairedfully:
fully repaired
|else:
partially repaired
{Occasionally(2,
cat(
OneOf("to ", "at "),
Humanise(event.health * 100),
" percent functionality"
)
)}
}
{Occasionally(2,
cat(OneOf(", ", "and is"), " ready for re-activation")
)}.
The output of this script could be "Engine module fully repaired." or "Engine module partially repaired, and is ready for re-activation."
Please note the last dot of the phrase, which in the code is after the last bracket.
This is another sample, with strings passed to functions inside other strings:
{OneOf("{ShipName()} has", "")}
{OneOf("left supercruise", "{OneOf(\"entered\", \"returned to\", \"dropped to\")} normal space")}
My question is:
how sublime-syntax files handle this kind of nidification?
Looking at the overview of the templating language over at https://cottle.readthedocs.io/en/stable/page/01-overview.html, it seems to be an easy syntax for which to write a .sublime-syntax for, but given the utter lack of resources for knowing how syntax files works in ST, I can understand it can be sometimes difficult to start or even understand.
So, I took the liberty of creating a starter syntax definition (the result of an hour & a half of boredom on a Saturday evening), which you can take and work upon. Note that I have not used the language and as such made it by just reading the docs and looking over code snippets.
You can find a gist for it here (https://gist.github.com/Ultra-Instinct-05/96fa99e1aaeb32b12d1e62109d61fcc2)
Here is a screenshot showing it in the color scheme I use (which follows the official scope naming guidelines).
It still lacks support for user defined functions (as I came to know from the docs) (and probably a few other things), but maybe that's something you can add to it !
Note that to use it, save the file as Cottle.sublime-syntax in your User package. Right now files having a .cottle extension are highlighted (because I don't know how you create a cottle file).
The syntax definition doesn't use any new feature added in ST4, so it should work the same in both ST3 & ST4.

How to let currency unmodified with MathJax

I am using MathJax with the following configuration:
window.MathJax = {
tex: {
inlineMath: [['$', '$'], ['\\(', '\\)']]
}
};
As you can see, there is nothing fancy.
I work really well and my inline math is correctly transformed.
My problem arise when I have sentences like With a total of twenty $25,000 USD prizes for US contestants and ten $30,000 CAD prizes for the Canucks in Phase 1 of the challenge.
As expected, the $25,000 USD prizes for US contestants and ten $ part is interpreted by MathJax.
As you can imagine, it's not something I am looking for.
Knowing that I have no control on the content because it's inside a feed reader, is there some configuration I can use to escape that kind of strings or I am out of luck and there is nothing I can do?
As per the MathJax documentation:
You can use \$ to prevent a dollar sign from being treated as a math delimiter within the text of your web page, e.g., use “… the cost is $2.50 for the first one, and $2.00 for each additional one …” to prevent these dollar signs from being used as math delimiters in a web page where dollar signs have been configured to be in-line delimiters.
An alternative method is to wrap $ in a span tag (since MathJax will stop searching for closing $ at the end of a span).

Variable amount of params express js

I am trying to define a route in express js that takes an unknown amount N of parameters. It should match the following routes, capturing all digit groups:
/scope
/scope/1/12
/scope/1/12/123
etc.
I wrote a regex for the matching of the n-amount of numbers, as follows:
/(?:\/?(\d+)\/?)/g
The global /g however doesn't seem to be allowed, see (The regex parser of express js on github). Am I doing something wrong here? I could solve this very ugly and dirty by doing something like:
^\/scope\/?(\d+)?\/?(\d+)?\/?(\d+)?
But this is not dynamic, feels dirty and if I add deeper levels of scoping I always will need to add more /?(\d+) regex parts, which is a model that does not fit my business logic. I am shure there must be a better way...
Okay, after a discussion with #vks, which was useful but unfortunately not answering the question, we came to the conclusion that this is not a regex problem. With the \g modifier a regex capturing all digit groups can quite easily be written, even in javascripts very limited regex engine.
The question now becomes more clearly formulated: since expressjs does not allow a full regex from begin to end, but rather encloses the regex you use in a route in it's own begin and end of a regex, not allowing /g modifiers, what is the expressjs idiomatic way to solve this problem?
^\/scope(?:\/\d+)*$
You can try this.See demo.
https://regex101.com/r/eZ0yP4/30

What's the name for hyphen-separated case?

This is PascalCase: SomeSymbol
This is camelCase: someSymbol
This is snake_case: some_symbol
So my questions is whether there is a widely accepted name for this: some-symbol? It's commonly used in url's.
There isn't really a standard name for this case convention, and there is disagreement over what it should be called.
That said, as of 2019, there is a strong case to be made that kebab-case is winning:
https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&q=kebab-case,spinal-case,lisp-case,dash-case,caterpillar-case
spinal-case is a distant second, and no other terms have any traction at all.
Additionally, kebab-case has entered the lexicon of several javascript code libraries, e.g.:
https://lodash.com/docs/#kebabCase
https://www.npmjs.com/package/kebab-case
https://v2.vuejs.org/v2/guide/components-props.html#Prop-Casing-camelCase-vs-kebab-case
However, there are still other terms that people use. Lisp has used this convention for decades as described in this Wikipedia entry, so some people have described it as lisp-case. Some other forms I've seen include caterpillar-case, dash-case, and hyphen-case, but none of these is standard.
So the answer to your question is: No, there isn't a single widely-accepted name for this case convention analogous to snake_case or camelCase, which are widely-accepted.
It's referred to as kebab-case. See lodash docs.
It's also sometimes known as caterpillar-case
This is the most famous case and It has many names
kebab-case: It's the name most adopted by official software
caterpillar-case
dash-case
hyphen-case or hyphenated-case
lisp-case
spinal-case
css-case
slug-case
friendly-url-case
As the character (-) is referred to as "hyphen" or "dash", it seems more natural to name this "dash-case", or "hyphen-case" (less frequently used).
As mentioned in Wikipedia, "kebab-case" is also used. Apparently (see answer) this is because the character would look like a skewer... It needs some imagination though.
Used in lodash lib for example.
Recently, "dash-case" was used by
Angular (https://angular.io/guide/glossary#case-types)
NPM modules
https://www.npmjs.com/package/case-dash (removed ?)
https://www.npmjs.com/package/dasherize
Adding the correct link here Kebab Case
which is All lowercase with - separating words.
I've always called it, and heard it be called, 'dashcase.'
There is no standardized name.
Libraries like jquery and lodash refer it as kebab-case. So does Vuejs javascript framework. However, I am not sure whether it's safe to declare that it's referred as kebab-case in javascript world.
I've always known it as kebab-case.
On a funny note, I've heard people call it a SCREAM-KEBAB when all the letters are capitalized.
Kebab Case Warning
I've always liked kebab-case as it seems the most readable when you need whitespace. However, some programs interpret the dash as a minus sign, and it can cause problems as what you think is a name turns into a subtraction operation.
first-second // first minus second?
ten-2 // ten minus two?
Also, some frameworks parse dashes in kebab cased property. For example, GitHub Pages uses Jekyll, and Jekyll parses any dashes it finds in an md file. For example, a file named 2020-1-2-homepage.md on GitHub Pages gets put into a folder structured as \2020\1\2\homepage.html when the site is compiled.
Snake_case vs kebab-case
A safer alternative to kebab-case is snake_case, or SCREAMING_SNAKE_CASE, as underscores cause less confusion when compared to a minus sign.
I'd simply say that it was hyphenated.
Worth to mention from abolish:
https://github.com/tpope/vim-abolish/blob/master/doc/abolish.txt#L152
dash-case or kebab-case
In Salesforce, It is referred as kebab-case. See below
https://developer.salesforce.com/docs/component-library/documentation/lwc/lwc.js_props_names
Here is a more recent discombobulation. Documentation everywhere in angular JS and Pluralsight courses and books on angular, all refer to kebab-case as snake-case, not differentiating between the two.
Its too bad caterpillar-case did not stick because snake_case and caterpillar-case are easily remembered and actually look like what they represent (if you have a good imagination).
My ECMAScript proposal for String.prototype.toKebabCase.
String.prototype.toKebabCase = function () {
return this.valueOf().replace(/-/g, ' ').split('')
.reduce((str, char) => char.toUpperCase() === char ?
`${str} ${char}` :
`${str}${char}`, ''
).replace(/ * /g, ' ').trim().replace(/ /g, '-').toLowerCase();
}
This casing can also be called a "slug", and the process of turning a phrase into it "slugify".
https://hexdocs.pm/slugify/Slug.html

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