I don’t know how much you’re like me, but if you are, you can get bogged down in the specific meaning of words, concepts, definitions and how these apply to the real world. I can personally have a difficult time bridging the gap between notional definitions and real world practice — for instance, . the beautiful castle on the hill we love called Agile versus what actually happens in the normal run of things I have faced a similar issue with functional programming as I continue to integrate it into my practical day-to-day. I just recently realized how much more I have in my own code. Ironically, this is a direct consequence of immutability — the very thing that held me back from seriously investigating FP for so long. “Immutable” is one of the most common words in the functional world’s lexicon. That’s been a bit hard on me because it just doesn’t find a happy home in my conceptual framework for “programming” at all. Inputs go into a program, the program changes them and the program spits out an answer. In other words, it the inputs :). trust and confidence mutates By now, of course, I know that immutability is actually a tactic. It just means that you aren’t changing the value of any of the things (at least as much as possible). From this simple (and usually simply followed) idea, flows much goodness. I find myself grappling a lot of with these little cognitive dissonance issues. In , using the function. But its very name (and the many canonical examples you find on the intertubes) leads people like me to initially conclude that its main purpose is to sum up an array of integers :). Having overcome that hurdle, I that are only loosely coupled with the normal English speaker’s understanding of “reduce.” JavaScript you don’t necessarily have to reduce things at all reduce use it for all kinds of things So if you’re like me — a bit of a stickler for literal definitions — and you’re interested in functional , try and let your guard down a bit. I have been chipping away at my preconceptions for a while now and I’ve been enjoying some success. You may too. programming </end> is how hackers start their afternoons. We’re a part of the family. We are now and happy to opportunities. Hacker Noon @AMI accepting submissions discuss advertising &sponsorship To learn more, , , or simply, read our about page like/message us on Facebook tweet/DM @HackerNoon. If you enjoyed this story, we recommend reading our and . Until next time, don’t take the realities of the world for granted! latest tech stories trending tech stories
