TypeScript (or the obligatory post about it)

Like many of you, I’ve been itching to see what Anders had up his sleeve and I wasn’t disappointed yesterday when they announcedTypeScript. After teaching all day, I took a quick look at TypeScript (and I do mean quick).

There was a lot of buzz yesterday and the response seemed to be in one of two camps (for the most part):

• From some: Microsoft is Saving the World from JavaScript
• From others: Microsoft is ruining JavaScript and is Just Recreating CoffeeScript

I think I am in the middle of this. TypeScript reminds me a lot of LESS. What I mean by that is that I think the smart thing they did was make all JavaScript valid TypeScript. In case that isn’t clear, TypeScript is a superset of JavaScript. This means that they’re adding some features to JavaScript to help with large, enterprise sized codebases including:

• Classes
• Modules
• Interfaces
• Parameter Typing

What I really do like is that, unlike CoffeeScript and other similar projects, is that it is JavaScript. That means that I only need to use TypeScript when I need these particular features. It should make it easier to add this into existing projects without having to do a whole new language. (Also, I am stay in my comfortable curly brace, semi-colon filled world ;)

Have you had a chance to see what it’s like? If so, what do you think?