Miss Dada  🏳️‍⚧️

I want to convert a string into a number in Node. It should reject (by throwing an error) any string that isn't a number, including strings like "0x1" and "NaN" and anything else that isn't (off the top of my head so forgive me) /\d+(\.\d+)?/. How do I do it?

helphttps://twitter.com/ericqweinstein/status/1100611559217197056 …

From the replies, the answer to this seems to be: "Most systems written in JavaScript don't bother with a safe way to parse a number from a string. If you try to parse a number from a buggy string that's not a number, you'll get NaN and it will propagate through the system."

This is the same problem that exists with null etc. A bug causes an unexpected value (null/undefined/NaN/etc.) Ideally you crash immediately; then the traceback shows where the problem is. But often, that value propagates through the system and causes distant, confusing failures.