Make fn built-in in strict-mode

[NullVoxPopuli]

Propose making (fn) a built in helper

Rendered

Summary

Today, we need

import { fn } from '@ember/helper'`;

This should be built in, and not require an import.

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[les2]

contrary point of view: if the code editor will be able to suggest the import for fn automatically then maybe implicit import isn't needed.

that said, it does seem useful to have a prologue (like java.lang.* in Java and similar things in other languages) that users can locally override via imports as desired.

👍🏿 from me

[SolPier]

I also :+1: the proposed alternative of a prolog of some kind, and if not no changes at all:

Coming from a ruby background I find 'magic' (implicit and untrackable injections of any object) exhausting, especially while debugging.

Not loving magic anymore meant JS imports where a blessing to me. And it seemed ember was going in this direction too, with the explicit imports of ember-template-imports for helpers, modifiers, components, potentially other filetypes ( :heart: ). Long gone where the days of debating the best conventions for filenames and locations/structure that we had during the 'Module Unification' #143, which aimed to make the implicit loading of local components work.

Not that to a user it has negative value (sugar feels good), but that would be an overhead to smo who wants to learn ember. Or to a rare ember user debugging / accessing a side project. The more vanilla and 'free of surprises' ember main files are, the better it is for its adoption in my opinion.

A prologue would be a good compromise.

[NullVoxPopuli]

A prologue would be a good compromise.

anyone can more or less do this themselves in userspace via this technique: https://github.com/emberjs/rfcs/pull/946#issuecomment-1685392130

especially while debugging.

has anyone ever needed to debug inside fn? if an abstraction has good error messages and in general isn't "leaky" - what's it matter if a feature is provided by the language vs developed in user space? we should optimize for convenience in this scenario.

We don't want to have folks importing if, each, each-in, let, <div>, <html> etc, otherwise... why have any language at all?

[SolPier]

Very good points, I see it clearer now, and you are right.

That means we have 2 kinds of helpers, those who are 'pre-loaded' and those who need an import from the user. And what routes this or that helper to one list is their usage frequency. if, each and each-in meets that threeshold from now, and I'm not sure let should.

It could be beneficial to have an explicit note / list / remarks about that in the documentation ? Just so it is known that not all helpers are used the same way (some require import, others don't).

But that's out of this PR scope.

[achambers]

Makes sense to me.

[achambers]

RFC Review (1) are in favour of this.

[kategengler]

We decided to move this RFC along with #997, #999, #1000 into FCP to accepted today at the RFC meeting.