I'll never understand the bytecode zealots and their insistence that browser makers scrap the years of JavaScript optimization they've done and start from scratch on some new format that will likely take another 10 or 15 years to get right.
You have what you want. You don't have to right in JavaScript any more. There are dozens of alternatives, and there are only going to be more. Source maps means you'll never even have to look at JavaScript. Please be happy!
Why should that "scrap years of JavaScript optimization"? That doesn't make sense. (Completely ignoring the fact, that JavaScript is not fast and will never be.)
Source-to-source-translation _always_ sucked and that's known for a few decades already.
> Why should that "scrap years of JavaScript optimization"? That doesn't make sense.
The bytecode that browsers compile JavaScript to are incompatible with each other. They would either have to pick one (wouldn't happen) or design one together (wouldn't happen).
A designed by committee bytecode would also effectively eliminate browser vendors' ability to compete on speed.
> Source-to-source-translation _always_ sucked and that's known for a few decades already.
In what way? From what I read Gambit Scheme compiles to C that is as fast as hand-crafted C. I would assume that CoffeeScript is no slower than regular old JavaScript. So if not speed, how are these things sucking?
You have what you want. You don't have to right in JavaScript any more. There are dozens of alternatives, and there are only going to be more. Source maps means you'll never even have to look at JavaScript. Please be happy!