[plug]

The dollar sign usually only bothers me after I've gone away and written a little Python. Actually, has anyone ever tried a 'CoffeeScript for PHP' that removed the dollar sign, replaced the `->` with dot syntax, and smoothed over the various other syntax features that people complain about? Not that I'd think there'd be much point really, apart from being a fun project.

[giaour]

Not sure how actively maintained it is, but you could try Mammouth: http://mammouth.wamalaka.com/

My only hesitation with it has been that you need Node.js to compile it to regular PHP -- it offers no analogue to coffeescript's eval-in-browser mode for development.