Yet Another JavaScript Framework

A curious bug surfaced in Mozilla Firefox's nightly build in March 2018: a weather widget on a German website vanished. The culprit? The website's use of the MooTools JavaScript library. This seemingly minor glitch revealed a potentially catastrophic problem, highlighting the complexities of web development and the legacy of older JavaScript frameworks.

The issue stemmed from MooTools' approach to extending JavaScript.

The Genesis of JavaScript Frameworks

JavaScript, initially released in 1995, revolutionized web development. By 2005, the rise of Ajax led to more complex JavaScript applications. Sam Stephenson, a Ruby on Rails contributor, created Prototype, an early JavaScript framework, to streamline Ajax interactions with Rails. Prototype cleverly leveraged JavaScript's prototypal inheritance, extending existing and future JavaScript features, effectively providing a "wish list" of functionalities before their official browser implementation. This approach, however, had unforeseen consequences.

Prototype's success paved the way for other frameworks. John Resig's jQuery, while inspired by Prototype, took a different route. Instead of extending existing prototypes, jQuery introduced new features and APIs, requiring developers to learn a new "jQuery way." This marked a significant paradigm shift.

Valerio Proietti, dissatisfied with another library, created MooTools in 2007. Like Prototype, MooTools extended core JavaScript functionalities using prototypal inheritance, often anticipating future browser features. This led to a popular rivalry: MooTools versus jQuery. Ultimately, neither framework's features determined its success; it was the sustained development and community support that propelled jQuery to greater prominence. MooTools, despite its widespread adoption, saw its development slow down by 2010.

The Array.flatten Conundrum

The Firefox bug highlighted the long-term implications of these older frameworks. MooTools' implementation of Array.flatten conflicted with the newly implemented native JavaScript version in Firefox. This seemingly small incompatibility threatened to break countless websites still relying on MooTools.

The ensuing debate within the JavaScript community revealed a fundamental question: should browser updates break existing websites, even if it means forcing upgrades and modernization? This sparked a discussion about the responsibility of browser makers to balance progress with backward compatibility. The proposed solutions ranged from letting older sites break to renaming the function entirely (leading to the infamous "Smooshgate").

Navigating the Legacy Web

The incident underscored the challenges of maintaining a constantly evolving web while respecting its vast legacy codebase. The question of responsibility—for maintaining outdated libraries, for abandoned websites, and for ensuring accessibility—remains complex. The final solution was a compromise: renaming the function to Array.flat. While not perfect, it demonstrated a commitment to balancing progress with the preservation of the existing web ecosystem.

The story of MooTools and the "Smooshgate" incident serves as a valuable lesson in the delicate balance between innovation and backward compatibility in web development. The web's open and inclusive nature demands careful consideration of its legacy, ensuring that progress doesn't come at the cost of accessibility and functionality for all users.

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