mathjs: [Design question] I don't like `factory`. Why don't we just use modules?

I’m working on this PR and the current dependency system of math.js seems really frustrating to me.

^^ the first lines of a more complicated script look like this with factory

To be more precise, I don’t understand why don’t we use ES6 modules more, instead of the factory function which to me seems worse in many ways (the code isn’t DRY at all, worse IntelliSense, problems with circular dependency).

I have a vague understanding that math.js has custom bundling support and some package-wide settings and that’s the reason why factory was invented, but I think these should be doable with modules too.

So what’s the reason why we use factory again? 😁️

About this issue

Original URL
State: closed
Created 4 years ago
Comments: 38 (12 by maintainers)

Commits related to this issue

Try out performance of dependency injection on individual function signatures (see #1975) — committed to josdejong/mathjs by josdejong 2 years ago

Most upvoted comments

On scalar functions:

it helps for performance and also better error messaging to have functions that only work for scalars.

I am thinking/hoping that the template implementations will be as good or better on both of these counts.

There was one (quite) specific circular dependency: divide needs inv, and inv needs divide. It may be possible to implement that differently though.

The Pocomath-style of infrastructure has no problem with co-recursion (as long as it bottoms out at some point). For example, the exact circular dependency you mention currently exists in Pocomath as it stands right now: the generic implementation of divide is via the invert operation (invert and multiply), and Complex relies on the generic, supplying a definition of invert that in turn uses divide (on its components). No special handling/syntax/anything is needed for such references, they are all just resolved at “bundling” time, as I call it (constructing a typed-function from the accumulated implementations for different signatures via the _bundle method, nothing to do with build-time bundling of JavaScript with webpack etc.) So that aspect will not require separate scalar functions.

gwhitney on Jul 31, 2022