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I'm sold. Does it have a translator for all my old js, like sass-convert? And can I set it to watch a directory for changes and recompile if I save a file, like

• jashkenas 16y ago
  It doesn't have a translator from JS to Coffee, I'm afraid. There isn't a one-to-one mapping (ie. detecting when you're actually using a for loop as an array comprehension). As for watching a directory for changes, absolutely. Just pass "--watch" to the "coffee" executable. For example: coffee --compile --watch --output lib src/ coffee -cw -o lib src/ Which will watch "src" for changes, and compile all ".coffee" files inside to ".js" files in "lib", preserving the directory structure.
  • dreyfiz 16y ago
    Excellent! I didn't think reverse translation would an easy problem for javascript, so I wasn't really expecting it.
  • dreyfiz 16y ago
    I've been working with coffeescript all evening and I'm loving it. My one suggestion/complaint so far is that you should follow Python more closely in refusing to accept an assignment in conditionals and insisting on comparisons only, because it eliminates a lot of bugs. E.g. if I type if x = y The compiler should raise a syntax error.
    • jashkenas 16y ago
      Glad you mentioned that point. The distinction between '=' and '==' in most programming languages is a personal pet peeve of mine. I think that it confuses two separate issues: labeling a value with a name, and testing the equality of values. Terrifically confusing stuff if you're coming from algebra. So, although '=' is available to make transitioning from other languages smoother, idiomatic CoffeeScript would use ':' for assignment, both within and outside of object literals, and would use 'is' for equality. Harder to make a bug out of: if x is y
      • dreyfiz 16y ago
        Thanks, I'd somehow missed "is" and "isnt" in the docs!