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by rmrfrmrf 5001 days ago
To me, TypeScript is the answer to 1) the perceived quirkiness of JavaScript to those who are unfamiliar with it and 2) an increasing number of developers coming out of college with heavy Java backgrounds. I see TypeScript taking off mainly because of the latter point--strict typing and well-defined OO practices will act as a decent safety net for new developers.
2 comments
giulianob 5001 days ago
Actually just about every popular library out there for JS creates some sort of fake OO layer on top of JS (e.g. Backbone, jQuery, Prototype, YUI, etc..). If you are just throwing a couple of scripts together then JS is fine but if you are trying to make an actual application, you need libraries to make it more OO.

I've worked on large code bases in several languages and JS has to got to be one of the worst when it comes to code quality due to the flexibility. It's always an awful experience trying to refactor a large portion of JS since it's difficult to even find where objects are being used. I'd take AS3 over JS anytime of the day since it allows me to specify types (though optional) and if I do the tooling is able to do a lot of the static analysis that is important in large projects. TypeScript still gives you plain old JS while allowing you to specify some extra information in order to facilitate development. It's actually new developers that aren't aware of these things and love JS from what I've seen. They haven't worked on large code bases and love the flexibility of JS. When you actually are trying to create proper abstractions in order to architect your code, you need visibility modifiers, you need interfaces, and you need types.

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WayneDB 5001 days ago
Javascript is quirky. It's a great language, but c'mon...please. That horse has been beaten to death and the long discussion on this topic alone is proof of it's quirkiness and it's numerous pitfalls.

The idea that (optional) strict typing and (optional) well-defined OO practices would only work to act as a "safety net" for new developers is, quite frankly, ludicrous. Static typing is the bedrock of static analysis and if you can't see the value in static analysis, take a read here - http://www.altdevblogaday.com/2011/12/24/static-code-analysi...

You're welcome to keep doing things the hard way. You will certainly be enabled to do so since Javascript is not going anywhere. But easy-to-use Javascript-compatible languages with powerful, precise and accessible features are the future, IMO. I don't think I'm alone in that sentiment given the recently budding interest in this arena.

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