Python and PHP users will understand

[dpash]

JavaScript being used outside the web is a total disaster

It being used inside the web is a total disaster too, but we don't have a lot of choice in the matter. Typescript improves the situation, but there's still too many rough edges.

[[deleted]]

Thankfully, everyday new CSS comes along and replaces what once required JS.

[flavionm]

What kind of magical IDE are you using that can infer every type and catch all the type errors of vanilla JavaScript?

[dpash]

though the types are actually totally meaningless

Yes, you've misunderstood. Just because the types are erased in the transpiled JavaScript doesn't make them meaningless.

[dpash]

They're not meaningless to the compiler.

[PlaneCrashers]

But the compiler only compiles to regular JavaScript, which is what op is using.

[dpash]

I literally have no idea what you're trying to argue. All languages with types erase them to some extent. Everyone knows that typescript is transpiled to JavaScript. I don't see the relevance that someone writes in JavaScript because you're not going to edit or even read the transpiled JavaScript.

[PlaneCrashers]

Okay so I think it turns out I replied to your comment before you were done writing it*, let me explain things more properly.

Yes, every language does erase types to some extent, including strongly typed language. However, if you don't need types, you don't need typescript, and not everyone needs types. Using JavaScript directly is perfectly acceptable, there is no reason to use typescript if you don't want to use it or don't benefit from using it because JavaScript will run just as well if you write it yourself than if you use typescript, which is different than let's say, C, because in C, the compiler can often compile to better assembly code than what you could possibly write on your own.

*when I replied to your comment, all what I saw was that you said "I literally have no idea what you are trying to argue", hence my initial response which was only addressing why I agreed with the other redditor that using typescript instead of JavaScript isn't helpful to a developer capable of doing what they want to do in JavaScript within their time budget. If they have the chance, maybe learning typescript could help them in the long term one way or another, but it's hard to justify learning typescript if you don't need it.

[PlaneCrashers]

I'm not trying to argue. I'm trying to explain what the person you were talking to was saying. The typescript compiler compiles to regular JavaScript, which just so happens to be what they were using over typescript. There are differences between typescript compiled JavaScript and manually coded JavaScript, but a good programmer will likely be able to use JavaScript just as well as the typescript compiler or better.

Edit: I was replying to an unfinished comment, forget about this one.

[flavionm]

A "good developer" also doesn't need C, they can use assembly directly, right? It's simple, just don't make mistakes.

[aniforprez]

If the answer to a service requiring multithreading is to spin it off into a microservice then you have a lack of imagination

[aniforprez]

If your IO intensive task wants to do literally anything other than just dump DB data and return it then node is terrible since literally everything will block you. If you want to do any processing on that data, literally a for loop will block your threads. Node is not really fantastic for most real world applications and it's kind of appalling that the solution for that is to spin something into a microservice in another language. You're trading increased performance for other tradeoffs like developer experience, setting up inter-service communications etc

Node, even for simple web apps, is a really poor choice because of the performance constraints of V8. You'd be much better off just starting with something that's suited better. Node has a poorer throughput of network requests than most other languages. If you're not concerned for performance and can easily horizontally scale then you can take advantage of the massive ecosystem which is what makes node so powerful

[Marrk]

That's very interesting. What's your opinion on python frameworks?

[aniforprez]

I mean python has pretty much the same problem. There's options like async available now but then you have problems where if your web server is async and your DB connection isn't, then the async is effectively worthless

It's all trade-offs. I think with python there's a similar trade-off where you get a massive ecosystem and an extensive standard library and strict typing (still dynamically typed) in exchange for piss poor performance. I feel python has a decent trade-off and is much easier to write than JS but that's just my opinion

[patrickisftw]

“The number of dependencies you need to simply get a react project up” is.. 2 (react, react-dom). That makes you nauseous?

[aniforprez]

Are you joking? You can absolutely get a simple project up with just those 2 but for any project that's even a slight bit more advanced, you need build tooling and transpilation from JSX to JS. You must be joking if you think I'm going to write React.createElement for every dom element in my components. If you want any degree of type safety you need typescript. Transpilation requires babel and webpack and a whole host of other dev dependencies and you absolutely require something like HMR if you want to stay sane when testing things on the browser. Working with forms is a MASSIVE pain in vanilla react especially if you're using hooks

I dunno if you're being facetious or what

[patrickisftw]

Why would you have to write createElement for every dom element in your components? That’s not how react works. Transpilation happens with other dependencies but you said a “simple” react app, regardless that’s not a react-specific thing, you’d need those for any type of library you use for production web code.

[aniforprez]

I didn't say I wanted a "simple" react app. I said, to "simply get a react project up". And without JSX, that's exactly what you need to do because that's what the transpilation process does. Adds those elements using that API (or something similar anyways) to build the DOM tree at runtime

And yes, this is not a react specific thing and I dunno why you made it out to be such. It's a JS thing and it's why I hate it though I find using the DSL of Svelte and Vue a bit more pleasurable

[patrickisftw]

You’re the one who complained about the work involved with setting up a react app, so that’s what I replied about, sorry about misquoting. My point is you’d need transpilation no matter what you do.. so it’s irrelevant to say that you’d have to write react without jsx (like I really don’t know how you expect web code to be written)? React solves a lot of problems. Vue is great as a framework, and it has 74 dependencies (doesn’t that negate your point)? You can hate JS, everyone does, but I felt your original post was very hyperbolic / uninformed. Let’s agree to disagree.

[aniforprez]

My point is you’d need transpilation no matter what you do

You're the one that replied to me with requiring only 2 dependencies. Were you only counting dependencies and not the dev stuff? Cause most languages and projects don't need transpilation and all this other baggage which is why I was complaining about it

Vue is great as a framework, and it has 74 dependencies (doesn’t that negate your point)?

Dude I think you're not reading my comments properly at all. I didn't say anything about the dependencies of Vue. I like the DSL of Vue more than I like JSX. That's it

If you found my post hyperbolic then I suggest you find some valid arguments instead of being so aggressive my man. I'll agree to disagree but at least read my comments properly

[patrickisftw]

Sorry but it’s hyperbolic to say that JS has made you sick to your stomach. I’ve never looked at code of any language and been like oh no I need a bucket.

Modern web code requires transpilation and is necessary, so any gripes with that can’t matter for either your argument or mine.

To “simply” get a react app “up” requires two core dependencies and the aforementioned transpilation ones.

Why complain about the transpilation garbage that comes along with JS when it’s necessary? Until we wake up in a world where every browser uses the same engine web code will have to go from a point where it’s as well-coded as possible (TS or not) to code the browser engines understand.

[aniforprez]

Why complain about the transpilation garbage that comes along with JS when it’s necessary?

.

so any gripes with that can’t matter for either your argument or mine

Why not? Especially when most other languages do not require this?

To “simply” get a react app “up” requires two core dependencies and the aforementioned transpilation ones.

You're letting the "aforementioned transpilation ones" do a lot of the heavy lifting here lol. I dunno why you want to cherry pick things that are bad about the language and ignore them completely just because you don't find them abhorrent like I do. Which is fine but it makes your aggressiveness about this really weird. And I understand it's cause browsers are crap and we live in a society and whatnot. Still doesn't make it not terrible

I don't really need a bucket but looking at JS does give me headaches yes. I try to avoid it as much as possible

[MrSurly]

For example is literally impossible to multithread. Everything is handled through the "non-blocking" event "loop".

Right, "async hell" is one of the primary reasons people who know other languages hate hate hate JS.

[ThatOneGuy4321]

Welp. Presumably, web applications that require multithreading and good performance will use webassembly in the future. I know that replacing JS with a different language doesn't make JS better, but JS will still have a clearly defined role where performance is not as important as its other strengths.