I’ve reading Reg Braithwaite’s JavaScript Allonge, which is great, but in reading it I discovered one of the ways JS is batshit crazy.

We’re all used to writing and calling named functions;

function iAmAvailable() { 
 console.log("iAmAvailable has been called");
}
iAmAvailable();

Which gives the nice predictable result;

iAmAvailable has been called

So far so good. And we know we can put a function expression into a variable;

var iPointToAFunction = function() {
 console.log("iPointToAFunction has been called");
}
iPointToAFunction();

And this gives what you would expect, too;

iPointToAFunction has been called

So far, no surprises. But what if you try both together? A function with a name assigned to a variable?

var iPointToAFunction = function butIAmUnavailable() {
 console.log("iPointToAFunction/butIAmUnavailable has been called");
}
iPointToAFunction();
butIAmUnavailable();

This gives the surprising result;

iPointToAFunction/butIAmUnavailable has been called
ReferenceError: butIAmUnavailable is not defined
    at repl:1:1
    at REPLServer.defaultEval (repl.js:132:27)
    at bound (domain.js:254:14)
    at REPLServer.runBound [as eval] (domain.js:267:12)
    at REPLServer. (repl.js:279:12)
    at REPLServer.emit (events.js:107:17)
    at REPLServer.Interface._onLine (readline.js:214:10)
    at REPLServer.Interface._line (readline.js:553:8)
    at REPLServer.Interface._ttyWrite (readline.js:830:14)
    at ReadStream.onkeypress (readline.js:109:10)

Which is really inconsistent. It seems that because the function has been assigned to a variable, it’s been excluded from the environment. Or maybe it’s the other way around; functions not assigned to variables automatically create a variable of the same name.

Either way, it feels to me that creating a function with a function expression should be more consistent — the grammar like

function x() { ... }

Should either create a function variable called x, or not create it, but not create it ‘only sometimes’, depending on whether you assign it.