Except there isn't any problem here whatsoever. Yes, it's coupled, but it doesn't matter. No, this kind of code doesn't scale. It doesn't have to.
The time you spent writing this comment was longer than what it took writing this code. Considering what kind of site this is, that code may work indefinitely. Or, if necessary, someone from the future will need to change that 3 to a 4 at some point. In terms of total cost, it's almost certainly the cheapest solution.
And how will that someone know what that 3 stands for ? At the minimum a comment above that line would have been nice.
They'll figure it out. They're a programmer, figuring things out is their job.
Re:How true hackers write JavaScript
by paulintrognon on Wednesday September 05, 2018 @04:34AM
(#17916091)
hidestory() is not even used anywhere ; why is it here for? Debugging?
Re:How true hackers write JavaScript
by fenomas on Wednesday September 05, 2018 @05:27AM
(#17916356)
It's called by the "hide" link under each story on the top page.
Re:How true hackers write JavaScript
by joshschreuder on Wednesday September 05, 2018 @04:50AM
(#17916184)
It is probably called in an onclick=“” in the HTML somewhere
On a side note this 3 should be at least assigned to a variable with a meaningful name.