Avoid ^ for exponentiation #18634

iugo · 2022-07-22T07:27:01Z

Summary

Use ** instead of ^.

Motivation

To avoid confusion with XOR.

Supporting details

Related issues

Metadata

Adds a new document
Rewrites (or significantly expands) a document
Fixes a typo, bug, or other error

To avoid confusion with XOR.

teoli2003 · 2022-07-22T07:34:48Z

So for a long time, JS had only pow() and no exponentiation operator. Using ^ wasn't really problematic.

I'm torn on this one.

What do you think, @Josh-Cena ? Should we ask this in a discussion to have more opinions? This will definitively have an impact on numerous other places on MDN.

Josh-Cena · 2022-07-22T07:40:43Z

What about using Math ML, or use a simple <sup>? I think ** is less readable and it's not meant to be code here anyway, so I think we should definitely remove the backticks. But I agree we shouldn't use ^ and I also tried to avoid this in the past.

teoli2003 · 2022-07-22T07:43:49Z

I think we should:

if it is not code but an explanation, do not have back-ticks and use <sup>;
if it is code, use **.

So avoid ^ and ** outside code.

I think we are in case 1 here.

files/en-us/web/javascript/reference/global_objects/number/max_safe_integer/index.md

iugo · 2022-07-22T07:44:35Z

I'm asking this question because the ^ symbol has two completely different meanings in math and programming.

https://stackoverflow.com/questions/4843304/why-is-my-power-operator-not-working

Hopefully there is a better way to avoid this ambiguity.

files/en-us/web/javascript/reference/global_objects/number/max_safe_integer/index.md

…_safe_integer/index.md Co-authored-by: Jean-Yves Perrier <jypenator@gmail.com>

Josh-Cena · 2022-07-22T07:46:43Z

I think it should be a one-time effort to fix it everywhere. We have about 20 pages with this issue. I'm going to commit to this branch.

teoli2003 · 2022-07-22T07:46:47Z

(I think MathML is a bit overkill for this, at least for the time being).

…_safe_integer/index.md Co-authored-by: Jean-Yves Perrier <jypenator@gmail.com>

github-actions · 2022-07-22T07:50:16Z

Preview URLs

Flaws

Note! 19 documents with no flaws that don't need to be listed. 🎉

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Data_structures
Title: JavaScript data types and data structures
on GitHub
Flaw count: 3

macros:
- wrong xref macro used (consider changing which macro you use)
- wrong xref macro used (consider changing which macro you use)
broken_links:
- Can't resolve /en-US/docs/Glossary/Symbol

External URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Guide/Numbers_and_dates
Title: Numbers and dates
on GitHub

No new external URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Guide/Indexed_collections
Title: Indexed collections
on GitHub

No new external URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Typed_arrays
Title: JavaScript typed arrays
on GitHub

No new external URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Data_structures
Title: JavaScript data types and data structures
on GitHub

No new external URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Operators/Bitwise_NOT
Title: Bitwise NOT (~)
on GitHub

No new external URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/TypedArray
Title: TypedArray
on GitHub

No new external URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Math
Title: Math
on GitHub

No new external URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Math/pow
Title: Math.pow()
on GitHub

No new external URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Math/trunc
Title: Math.trunc()
on GitHub

No new external URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Math/exp
Title: Math.exp()
on GitHub

No new external URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Math/expm1
Title: Math.expm1()
on GitHub

No new external URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/String/length
Title: String length
on GitHub

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URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/parseInt
Title: parseInt()
on GitHub

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URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Number
Title: Number
on GitHub

No new external URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Number/isSafeInteger
Title: Number.isSafeInteger()
on GitHub

No new external URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Number/EPSILON
Title: Number.EPSILON
on GitHub

No new external URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Number/MIN_SAFE_INTEGER
Title: Number.MIN_SAFE_INTEGER
on GitHub

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_precision_floating-point_format (1 time) (Note! This may be a new URL 👀)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEEE_floating_point (1 time) (Note! This may be a new URL 👀)

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Number/MAX_VALUE
Title: Number.MAX_VALUE
on GitHub

No new external URLs

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Number/MAX_SAFE_INTEGER
Title: Number.MAX_SAFE_INTEGER
on GitHub

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double_precision_floating-point_format (1 time) (Note! This may be a new URL 👀)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/IEEE_floating_point (1 time) (Note! This may be a new URL 👀)

URL: /en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Number/MIN_VALUE
Title: Number.MIN_VALUE
on GitHub

No new external URLs

(this comment was updated 2022-07-22 08:06:56.097474)

Josh-Cena · 2022-07-22T08:04:50Z

I realized we have this guide, though: https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/MDN/Contribute/Markdown_in_MDN#superscript_and_subscript We should reconsider that suggestion.

teoli2003

Let's go like this 😃

iugo · 2022-07-26T10:21:52Z

I noticed some previous related discussions. #4578 (comment)

Maybe should remove particular for exponentiation.

teoli2003 · 2022-07-26T10:54:56Z

Yes, that discussion happened when we moved to Markdown last year. Before we stored our pages in HTML.

We tried to minimize the use of HTML tags.

We decided to keep the <sup> tag when useful.

Use ** instead of ^

92a3b6b

To avoid confusion with XOR.

iugo requested a review from a team as a code owner July 22, 2022 07:27

iugo requested review from Josh-Cena and removed request for a team July 22, 2022 07:27

github-actions bot added the Content:JS JavaScript docs label Jul 22, 2022

teoli2003 reviewed Jul 22, 2022

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Update files/en-us/web/javascript/reference/global_objects/number/max…

a82c6f0

…_safe_integer/index.md Co-authored-by: Jean-Yves Perrier <jypenator@gmail.com>

Update files/en-us/web/javascript/reference/global_objects/number/max…

5a1c8c9

…_safe_integer/index.md Co-authored-by: Jean-Yves Perrier <jypenator@gmail.com>

Josh-Cena changed the title ~~Use ** instead of ^~~ Avoid ^ for exponentiation Jul 22, 2022

Update index.md

3708206

fix all occurences

2cc2677

Josh-Cena requested a review from teoli2003 July 22, 2022 08:34

teoli2003 approved these changes Jul 22, 2022

View reviewed changes

teoli2003 merged commit 2e2eab5 into mdn:main Jul 22, 2022

iugo deleted the patch-1 branch July 26, 2022 10:18

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Avoid ^ for exponentiation #18634

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iugo commented Jul 22, 2022 •

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Avoid ^ for exponentiation #18634

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Summary

Motivation

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teoli2003 commented Jul 22, 2022

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iugo commented Jul 22, 2022

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