Degobah and JavaScript Allongé

LUKE
(into comlink)
We're not going to regroup with the others.

Artoo begins a protest, whistling an unbelieving, "What?!"
Luke reads Artoo's exclamation on his control panel.

LUKE
(into comlink) We're going to the Dagobah system.

Luke checks his readouts and makes a few adjustments. He rides along with only the soft hum of the instruments to break the silence. Finally, Artoo chirps up.

LUKE
(into comlink)
Yes, Artoo?

Artoo utters a soft, carefully phrased steam of whistles.

LUKE
(into comlink, chuckling)
That's all right. I'd like to keep it on manual control for a while.

There is a book about computer programming, and it is called JavaScript Allongé. It is more than a little bit remarkable. It does not try to be all things to all people. It does not attempt to exhaustively list all of the features of the language, not even the good parts. Instead it does something altogether original and startling, in the realm of technical writing. It teaches you to think. Just as the Little Schemer teaches us to think recursively, JavaScript Allongé teaches us to think functionally.

In this respect, the language that the book is written in is in a sense secondary. Although JavaScript is well suited to such a journey through the finer points of functional thinking, it is not JavaScript which the book is about.

JavaScript Allongé is a rich and evocative narrative that is written in JavaScript, just as Ornette Coleman's "Lonely Woman" is a narrative played in a jazz setting, but altogether set apart and above compositions that seem only about jazz, and sadly, nothing else. Just as Ornette's ruggedly unique voice showed us "The Shape of Jazz to Come", so does Reginald “raganwald” Braithwaite show that we can use programming languages to tell a story as unique and individual as the mind that dreamt it.

Don't get me wrong, we still need to "regroup with the others" as a community around standards, best practices, and yes, to even admit to ourselves that we still don't know JS, but we also need to seek out Yoda, deep in the murk of Degobah, bestowing remarkable knowledge of the Force. And yes, seeming like a bit of a crazy crack-pot from time to time.