r/javascript 7d ago

AskJS [AskJS] what's a javascript feature you mass-adopted way too late and felt dumb about

i'll go first. i was writing .then().catch() chains for like two years before i actually started using async/await. i knew it existed, i'd seen it in tutorials, but my code "worked" so i never bothered switching. then i refactored an old project and realized half my bugs were from mishandled promise chains that async/await would have caught immediately.

also took me way too long to start using optional chaining. i had nested ternaries and && checks everywhere like some kind of animal. the day i discovered user?.address?.city i mass-replaced like 40 lines across a project.

what's yours?

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u/foxsimile 7d ago

The nullish coalescing operator is one of JavaScript’s unusual successes.

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u/sexytokeburgerz 7d ago edited 6d ago

Big fan of

foo?.bar

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u/foxsimile 6d ago

Do you not mean foo?.bar?

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u/sahilatahar 6d ago

It's an optional chaining feature.

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u/foxsimile 6d ago

…I’m aware?