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There's some comparisons here[0] As far as I can tell, where it falls somewhat short is in template dynamism, e.g. keyed arrays in React (which entails that dr

by lhorie 6y ago

There's some comparisons here[0] As far as I can tell, where it falls somewhat short is in template dynamism, e.g. keyed arrays in React (which entails that drag/drop might also potentially be tricky), fractal structures like generating HN comment trees from JSON (vue, for example, used to have perf issues in the early days in this area due to recursive-descent rendering instead of batching), etc. It seems to dabble a bit into normal control flow structures[1] but once you're at that level of language complexity, I'd probably prefer using a more established framework over this natural language DSL. The HN comment tree use case, for example, doesn't seem very easy to optimize if it turns out to be implemented in terms of reading the DOM to trigger subtemplate creation. I think it's certainly interesting that there's now interest in alternatives to compiled stacks (e.g. React, due to JSX, anything using Typescript, etc) that are mindful of compile time creep and aim to bring development speed back into the limelight, but I fear that projects like this might be making the original "mistake" of shoving the perf pitfalls back to the runtime (where the users care). Personally, I think the future is going to be better compiler infrastructure e.g. esbuild, swc and the projects built on top of them (vite, etc). [0] https://hyperscript.org/comparison/ https://hyperscript.org/comparison/ [1] https://hyperscript.org/commands/repeat/ https://hyperscript.org/commands/repeat/

IggleSniggle 6y ago
Just a shout-out to esbuild: I've been working with it and, while it does have a few rough-spots occasionally...in addition to how fast it is, I love how easy it is to work with and write unique behavior for as necessary. I never really fully digested Webpack, and I think part of that was because of the way it pushed its plugin ecosystem. By contrast, esbuild's plugin system is super easy to understand and placed front and center with the ecosystem off to one side, so if you write a esbuild script (in js OR Go), it's really easy to just write code to do what you want to have done instead of hoping that a bunch of third-party plugins can work together in the way that you want. Anway, I haven't used swc, but I agree with your assessment. I look at all of the projects that are being worked in that rely on esbuild and swc and they all point to really pleasant development experiences that also have the capability of producing performant code. What I haven't looked at recently is some of the other language specific pipelines. Is anyone here using non-TypeScript compilers to target JavaScript (like Kotlin, Scala, ClosureScript, ReasonML/Bucklescript) that could speak to the dev experience of the toolchain in 2021, as well as the resulting performance of the js? I'm pretty happy with TypeScript and get happier with each new release, but I'm also really interested in hearing other perspectives about language toolchains targeting js, and what folks are building with them.

by lhorie 6y ago

IggleSniggle 6y ago

Just a shout-out to esbuild: I've been working with it and, while it does have a few rough-spots occasionally...in addition to how fast it is, I love how easy it is to work with and write unique behavior for as necessary. I never really fully digested Webpack, and I think part of that was because of the way it pushed its plugin ecosystem. By contrast, esbuild's plugin system is super easy to understand and placed front and center with the ecosystem off to one side, so if you write a esbuild script (in js OR Go), it's really easy to just write code to do what you want to have done instead of hoping that a bunch of third-party plugins can work together in the way that you want. Anway, I haven't used swc, but I agree with your assessment. I look at all of the projects that are being worked in that rely on esbuild and swc and they all point to really pleasant development experiences that also have the capability of producing performant code. What I haven't looked at recently is some of the other language specific pipelines. Is anyone here using non-TypeScript compilers to target JavaScript (like Kotlin, Scala, ClosureScript, ReasonML/Bucklescript) that could speak to the dev experience of the toolchain in 2021, as well as the resulting performance of the js? I'm pretty happy with TypeScript and get happier with each new release, but I'm also really interested in hearing other perspectives about language toolchains targeting js, and what folks are building with them.