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In computer programming, an anonymous function (function literal, expression or block) is a function definition that is not bound to an identifier. Anonymous functions are often arguments being passed to higher-order functions or used for constructing the result of a higher-order function that needs to return a function. [ 1 ]
Immediately invoked function expressions may be written in a number of different ways. [3] A common convention is to enclose the function expression – and optionally its invocation operator – with the grouping operator, [4] in parentheses, to tell the parser explicitly to expect an expression.
The term closure is often used as a synonym for anonymous function, though strictly, an anonymous function is a function literal without a name, while a closure is an instance of a function, a value, whose non-local variables have been bound either to values or to storage locations (depending on the language; see the lexical environment section below).
The usual alternative is to use named functions and named recursion. Given an anonymous function, this can be done either by binding a name to the function, as in named function expressions in JavaScript, or by assigning the function to a variable and then calling the variable, as in function statements in JavaScript.
This is an accepted version of this page This is the latest accepted revision, reviewed on 18 January 2025. High-level programming language Not to be confused with Java (programming language), Javanese script, or ECMAScript. JavaScript Screenshot of JavaScript source code Paradigm Multi-paradigm: event-driven, functional, imperative, procedural, object-oriented Designed by Brendan Eich of ...
While it may seem like that is the case in the example above, what is really happening is that the JavaScript engine of the browser creates an anonymous function containing the statements in the onclick attribute. The onclick handler of the element would be bound to the following anonymous function:
Non-local variables are the primary reason it is difficult to support nested, anonymous, higher-order and thereby first-class functions in a programming language. If the nested function or functions are (mutually) recursive, it becomes hard for the compiler to know exactly where on the call stack the non-local variable was allocated, as the frame pointer only points to the local variable of ...
Notably, the delivery need not be made by the clerk who took the order. A callback need not be called by the function that accepted the callback as a parameter. Also, the delivery need not be made directly to the customer. A callback need not be to the calling function. In fact, a function would generally not pass itself as a callback.