Transpilation is the number one reason I've seen that makes maintenance of older projects hard. The fact that JS didn't standardize on a module syntax until far too late means that we're forced into a transpilation cycle to build bigger projects. I can call that a mistake without denying it's reality.
If you want to build a web application, at some point, until we have true web assembly, you will have to use javascript, which does make a lot of the arguments here moot, regardless of the size of the project.
>Transpilation is the number one reason I've seen that makes maintenance of older projects hard. The fact that JS didn't standardize on a module syntax until far too late means that we're forced into a transpilation cycle to build bigger projects. I can call that a mistake without denying it's reality.
You answered your own objection. The language is deficient so alternatives are sought (lack of standard modules is one problem). Nobody likes transpilation and nobody would do it if JavaScript was conducive to building and maintaining large applications.
>If you want to build a web application, at some point, until we have true web assembly, you will have to use javascript
No. You can build it in TypeScript or Dart or any number of more sane language and transpile to JavaScript. Which is what people are doing.
>No. You can build it in TypeScript or Dart or any number of more sane language and transpile to JavaScript. Which is what people are doing.
Exactly, you can't avoid javascript. Transpilation is at best a level of indirection.
I'm not answering my own objections, rather I'm pointing out that transpilation is a necessary evil, but it _was_ a mistake compared to the alternative, namely fixing modules.
You will have to refactor everything and entirely change your toolchain every two years. If you had the misfortune of using some framework, it will no longer be supported by then.
No JS application has that kind of longevity, because the entire ecosystem is extremely volatile.
No they are not 'moot'. At least not if you're building applications with 100k+ LOC. For dinky websites and small projects I'm with you.
>Introducing transpiling as a mandatory pattern for JS development was a mistake.
Again, what are you building? A dinky website, or a large application that you'll have to maintain for the next 10 years?