I'm not sure why so many think Javascript is bad. In my opinion, the new version of ECMAScript is heading in the wrong direction by adding classes and more Jav

I'm not sure why so many think Javascript is bad. In my opinion, the new version of ECMAScript is heading in the wrong direction by adding classes and more Java/C++ features. C++ has so much cruft I can't possibly remember all that stuff (the standard is hundreds of pages if I recall correctly). Javascript has the benefit of being a very powerful, light-weight language. CoffeeScript removes the quirks of Javascripts and emphasizes the functional aspects. My Coffeescript code is easily more expressive than the C++ code to do something equivalent (as long as it's not low-level system stuff or HPC critical). First-class functions, maps, folds -- yes please! And even though Javascript objects aren't technically maps, everyone uses them for that (and V8 optimizes them for that) and the syntax is amazingly brief. I think Javascript for a desktop API is a good idea. As to Microsoft's implementation of such a desktop API, I can't comment since I haven't used it. EDIT: Just read through the Windows Javascript API. Holy crap, they screwed that up badly! So much potential...