[whatwg] ECMAScript extensions in Web Applications

[Ian Hickson]

On Sat, 15 Oct 2005, Krzysztof Maczynski wrote:
>
>> From http://www.whatwg.org/specs/web-apps/current-work/:
> 
> "In the ECMAScript binding itself, however, the handleEvent() method of 
> the interface is not directly accessible on Function objects. Such 
> functions must be called in the global scope."
> 
> Why is that? Only to declare current browsers compliant?

Yes.


> Reflection mechanisms (abound in ECMAScript) will be of limited use, 
> especially in multi-language programming. Special treatments will need 
> to be hardwired into development tools (debuggers, inspectors, wizards, 
> code editing assistants, metadata handlers). Disobeying design 
> principles sooner or later tends to turn out to be short-sightedness.
>
> If you really want at this price to legitimate current implementations, 
> at least make this hideous practice optional, not mandatory. And 
> deprecated from the start.

I'm not really sure what you're proposing. Are you suggesting that any 
Function object should have a .handleEvent() method in addition to its 
.call() method and its .prototype attribute? What would be the point?

-- 
Ian Hickson               U+1047E                )\._.,--....,'``.    fL
http://ln.hixie.ch/       U+263A                /,   _.. \   _\  ;`._ ,.
Things that are impossible just take longer.   `._.-(,_..'--(,_..'`-.;.'