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Angular Announces AngularDart

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Re: Angular Announces AngularDart

#151

Post by ahoge »

cletus wrote: post #61

I'm really starting to get tired of the cynical and snarky negativity on HN. Whoever thinks this is part of some grand plan to force Dart down our throats clearly has no clue whatsoever about how Google works. Standard disclaimer: I'm a Google engineer and these opinions are my own and don't reflect those of my employer. Google is a really large company with >10,000 engineers. A lot of what we do starts as grassroots…

> browsers that don't support Dart in the browser (which is all of them except Chrome)

All but Dartium. Even Chrome doesn't support it natively yet.

> Dart's type system is basically just the Closure JsDoc system used by the Closure compiler.

Yes, it's basically something like that. The difference is that it's terser and far more convenient to use. Since it's baked into the language, it's standardized and properly supported by all tools.

Another difference is that you immediately benefit from putting those annotations at the boundaries. You get the checks and call-tips right off the bat.

> Dart is really just another Coffeescript

No, Dart and TypeScript offer proper tooling. CS doesn't.

Dart also offers much nicer semantics.

> One of the benefits of development in JavaScript is you can simply refresh your browser and it just works.

Same with Dart. You just use Dartium during development.

Re: Angular Announces AngularDart

#152

Post by pjmlp »

afsina wrote: post #146
pjmlp wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is that different from all the other languages out there that transpile to JavaScript?

Dart's one advantage is very fast development cycle if you use Dart VM in Dartium. No js compilation needed. Very well designed user APIs, Excellent modularity (with pub) and good editor support eliminates many opponents.

I have that with many other languages as well.

Re: Angular Announces AngularDart

#154

Post by nailer »

floitsch wrote: post #97
nailer wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When dart was released its authors asked for and received, some very specific feedback about syntax which they mentioned they'd be amenable to changing. Nothing has changed. Much like android dart is controlled by a small group of engineers in Google. Where's the source code to the current HEAD of dart? I'm pretty sure it's not on GitHub. What features are planned for the next release? I'm fairly sure dart-discuss do…

Current HEAD of dart: https://code.google.com/p/dart/source/browse/#svn%2Fbranches... Most of the work is done completely in the open. See some of the language discussion writeups: https://groups.google.com/a/dartlang.org/forum/#!searchin/mi... We went public two years ago when the language was still in its infancy so that developers could provide their feedback. Edit: contrary to your claim we did get feedback and a…

Thanks for the link. It appears to be a subversion repo. Is that correct?

The most popular feedback from HN https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=3092558 and Twitter was was less verbose syntax. AFAICT dart remains as chatty as the day it was announced.

Re: Angular Announces AngularDart

#155

Post by johnyzee »

cletus wrote: post #61

I'm really starting to get tired of the cynical and snarky negativity on HN. Whoever thinks this is part of some grand plan to force Dart down our throats clearly has no clue whatsoever about how Google works. Standard disclaimer: I'm a Google engineer and these opinions are my own and don't reflect those of my employer. Google is a really large company with >10,000 engineers. A lot of what we do starts as grassroots…

Love GWT, and for the moment, unlike Dart, it uses a language that is viable for both server and client-side code. Until Dart catches up to Java (particularly for the server-side part), I'll be happily using GWT. Dart looks promising, though.

Re: Angular Announces AngularDart

#156

Post by ceronman »

nailer wrote: post #89
cletus wrote: post #61

I'm really starting to get tired of the cynical and snarky negativity on HN. Whoever thinks this is part of some grand plan to force Dart down our throats clearly has no clue whatsoever about how Google works. Standard disclaimer: I'm a Google engineer and these opinions are my own and don't reflect those of my employer. Google is a really large company with >10,000 engineers. A lot of what we do starts as grassroots…

When dart was released its authors asked for and received, some very specific feedback about syntax which they mentioned they'd be amenable to changing. Nothing has changed. Much like android dart is controlled by a small group of engineers in Google. Where's the source code to the current HEAD of dart? I'm pretty sure it's not on GitHub. What features are planned for the next release? I'm fairly sure dart-discuss do…

> When dart was released its authors asked for and received, some very specific feedback about syntax which they mentioned they'd be amenable to changing. Nothing has changed.

This is simply not true! I've been following the language for a long time and they have made a lot of changes, they have listened to feedback. Just search 'BREAKING CHANGE' on the mailing lists. During the first year there were tons of changes to the language and libraries. Now they trying to stabilize the APIs

Re: Angular Announces AngularDart

#157

Post by ahoge »

Helianthus wrote: post #67
cletus wrote: post #61

I'm really starting to get tired of the cynical and snarky negativity on HN. Whoever thinks this is part of some grand plan to force Dart down our throats clearly has no clue whatsoever about how Google works. Standard disclaimer: I'm a Google engineer and these opinions are my own and don't reflect those of my employer. Google is a really large company with >10,000 engineers. A lot of what we do starts as grassroots…

There might not be a formalized 'grand plan,' but Dart doesn't have the open, cheerful intentions of CoffeeScript. It's being designed as a javascript replacement. Google's overbearing intention is obvious. You're right: Dart is, functionally, another CoffeeScript, but that's despite Google's plan--ok, 'experiment'--not by design. >So, please, can we discuss this on its merits Your criticisms are shared. That's what…

> It's being designed as a javascript replacement.

Yes, it is. But I'm not sure why you're viewing that as something negative.

It addresses the kind of problems everyone encounters when they try to write bigger applications in JavaScript.

GWT and the Closure Compiler also did this kind of thing. Dart does the same, but in a far more elegant manner. It's terser and the workflow is far more streamlined.

Having proper tooling is really great. Also, thanks to the type annotations you'll need fewer tests, you get better documentation, and it also acts as a safety net for refactoring/maintenance work.

It will enable more people (myself included) to write larger high-quality web applications.

Re: Angular Announces AngularDart

#158

Post by ahoge »

nateabele wrote: post #2

Sigh ... I knew this was going to happen. :-/ This is part of Google's strategy to push Dart in the browser. Soon they're going to start developing Angular primarily in Dart, and 'back-porting' features to JavaScript. Sadly, this is the nature of so-called "Open Source" at Google.

> Sadly, this is the nature of so-called "Open Source" at Google.

What's up with those scare quotes? Angular is open source (MIT), not "open source".

Re: Angular Announces AngularDart

#159

Post by likeclockwork »

xixixao wrote: post #92
spankalee wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are "open, cheerful intentions"? Open? Dart has been open-sourced for 2 years now - only having its proof-of-concept done in-house before the announcement. Cheerful? Not sure how one language that compiles to JS is more "cheerful" than an other, but we're really a cheerful bunch in person. I'm sure you could have a beer with us if you'd like :) As to the your and the OP's point about Dart being another CoffeeScr…

There is one major difference between Dart and CoffeeScript: The Angular team didn't have to take a 3 month holiday to make Angular work with CoffeeScript. If Dart was just another compile-to-JS language, then they wouldn't have to bother at all. Yet, CoffeeScript is not just a different syntax - for one, it changes declarations and scoping rules. That's a pretty big semantic change (comparison operators etc. follow)…

They actually rewrote Angular in Dart, they didn't just make it work with Dart.

Re: Angular Announces AngularDart

#160

Post by pcwalton »

discreteevent wrote: post #147
pcwalton wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Dart has a nice IDE, good clean types and language design. I have a serious problem with Dart's design: the type system is deliberately unsound around generics because the designers apparently think that supporting variance (which is not that difficult!) is worse than having types tell the truth . I would much rather there be no type system at all than there to be an unsound one, as I don't think compilers and IDE'…

I don't understand this. Dart is a dynamic language that gives you the option of adding types that help with tooling, documentation and some type checking at design time. At run time you can run it in checked mode and it will always tell the truth. This means that if you cover your code at all, manually or automatically then it will inform you of type errors. If you don't cover your code before releasing it then you…

> Dart is a dynamic language that gives you the option of adding types that help with tooling, documentation and some type checking at design time.

But the tooling and documentation aren't telling you what will happen at runtime.

> At run time you can run it in checked mode and it will always tell the truth.

It doesn't tell you the truth. A static type system is designed to rule out errors are compile time. That's what makes a static type system different from type assertions or guards.

Besides, I don't really know what "telling you the truth" means if, for example, function arguments unify under covariance instead of contravariance like they should. Whether that happens at runtime or at compile time makes no difference—it's equally wrong either way.

> This means that if you cover your code at all, manually or automatically then it will inform you of type errors.

This is always true in any dynamic language.

> How is this worse than a dynamic language that offers you no optional typing with full checking at runtime?

In JS's case we can still add a static type system that's actually sound, whereas Dart has already crossed the bridge into unsoundness.

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