13681 2011-08-05 05:41:19 +0000 Make FormData.append return the FormData object 2012-11-22 21:58:14 +0000 1 1 1 Unclassified WebAppsWG XHR unspecified PC All RESOLVED WONTFIX P2 normal --- 1 jonas annevk mike public-webapps waldron.rick public-webapps-bugzilla oldest_to_newest 54217 0 jonas 2011-08-05 05:41:19 +0000 If we change the FormData.append function to return the FormData object on which the function was called, it would allow syntax like myformdata.append("foo", file).append("bar", "text").append("baz", blob); as well as xhr.send((new FormData).append("afile", myfile)); 54220 1 annevk 2011-08-05 08:23:58 +0000 We do not use that pattern anywhere else as far as I know. 55323 2 jonas 2011-08-17 16:53:09 +0000 That's a terrible reason not to do something! There are lots of things that the DOM didn't used to do but which were a good idea and that we're slowly starting to do now. Do you have a technical reason why you don't think we should provide the nicer syntax in comment 0? 55359 3 annevk 2011-08-17 22:19:07 +0000 Is it established chaining is a good idea? What other APIs use this? 55363 4 ayg 2011-08-17 22:21:20 +0000 There are lots of DOM methods that could adopt this syntax. It's one of the things that helps make jQuery concise: you can chain repeated method calls without having to repeat the thing you're calling it on. In many cases you can completely avoid temporaries. Like consider document.body.appendChild(document.createElement("foo") .setAttribute("bar", "baz") .setAttribute("quz", "qoz")); vs. var element = document.createElement("foo"); element.setAttribute("bar", "baz"); element.setAttribute("quz", "qoz"); document.body.appendChild(element); which is one extra line with an extra temporary. Is there any reason we shouldn't adopt this convention across the board for DOM methods with void return type? Compat risk is conceivable, but I shouldn't think it's at all certain, and it seems worth it to try. 78610 5 annevk 2012-11-21 21:25:51 +0000 Once ECMAScript adopts this pattern, and looking at https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/Map it won't, we should consider it, no sooner imo. 78667 6 waldron.rick 2012-11-22 21:58:14 +0000 I've added an agenda item for the coming TC39 meeting to discuss |this| returns in new API. See also: http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-script-coord/2012OctDec/0164.html