Submitted by “Google has released an early version of Dart, a new programming language designed to take some of the pain out of developing applications for the Web. But while it’s an evolutionary improvement on JavaScript, Dart faces a hard uphill battle for acceptance.”
Google Dart Unveiled: Farewell, JavaScript
41 Comments
2011-10-11 8:28 am
2011-10-11 11:16 am
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2011-10-12 5:25 pm
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2011-10-12 3:38 am
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2011-10-11 11:32 pm
UltraZelda64
No, seriously; am I the only one who keeps misreading the headline as “Google Fart Unveiled?” If so, what a way to kill JavaScript. 
2011-10-12 2:02 am
2011-10-12 12:38 pm
2011-10-12 1:24 pm
Main problem with Dart is that it’s not an evolutionary improvement on Javascript, it’s an all new Virtual Machine.
So, none of your old js code will run with your new Dart code.
IMO, how google should have implemented this would have been to add optional type tracking in their v8 js engine optimization paths, and provide a thin frontend that turns dart language to javascript + extras.
This way, you could intermingle Dart and JS code freely.
I am a bit underwhelmed about Dart because google took this route. We already have CoffeeScript that is a great language that directly maps to JS code (but eliminates “function” keyword, has list comprehensions from python, has classes, etc.). CoffeeScript works seamlessly with JS code – can run it, can get run by it.
Hmmm… I do think it’s a bit of a weird sell – that is to pitch this as a JS replacement but as an application language it’s not too bad (I’ll admit I haven’t _really_ dug into it).
Standard sort of class/interface stuff going on. Generics look usable but, like Java, have nothing like the expressive, computational qualities of C++ templates.
Given the more rigorous type engine I’d expect faster code execution than JS too – probably less type/method searching going on.
However, 10 out of 10 for “isolates”. They seem to have a solid memory and process model but have made the message sends “invisible” – that is a method invocation becomes a message send. The doc I read didn’t go into a huge amount of detail on the actual implementation (are objects copied as they go across the process boundary or have they implemented a binder/ref count system with (maybe) CoW)? Simply hiding the implementation this way is good enough.
As an application programming language I wonder if it was a better use in Android? It can’t be _too_ hard to port Java code to Dart once the libraries are put together and lets Google stick 2 fingers up to the over inflated ego of Mr Ellison.
Maybe getting it into browsers (even if only Chrome) is a good way of getting an implementation into developers hands.
If I understand correctly it is possible to translate Dart into Javascript. Please look at Point 3. in this file https://code.google.com/p/dart/source/browse/branches/bleeding_edge/…
Yeah I saw that too — doubt it can use existing javascript libraries though – which is neither here nor there, I suppose. If the project were to succeed, in time we would see dart libraries created to fill the void. In that case, we could write in dart and convert to javascript for browsers which don’t support dart natively.
The ability to code in Javascript isn’t being removed for sometime yet, that would be stupid. most sites these days incorporate some javascript so they wouldn’t remove the ability to parse it for some time yet. All that dart is is a more senseible language for creating web-applications on, which is possible in javascript its just a pain
Well, the main reason why I use Js libraries is because they make up for things that JS is missing. If dart already has them built in, then my use cases for those JS libraries is greatly decreased.
They are planning on modifying GWT to output dart at some point as well, and have hinted at a 100% dart version of it ( dart running on server, dart running in client).
Check out what Dart “Hello World” looks like when compiled to Javascript:
https://gist.github.com/1277224
No kidding.
CoffeeSctipt, OTOH, maps to JS quite directly.
Only 17,259 lines of code. I can write that in less than a week. :-O
Well Dart really is not supposed to be translated to Javascript to begin with. Once it’s got its own VM on chrome I’d expect it to be lighter and faster than JS.
I think the point is that you will then run the output of Dart through the Google Closure compiler. In that way all the extra cruft is stripped out.
ClojureScript does the same thing. A stock “unoptimzied” “Hello World” is pages and pages of standard library functions, but it is also designed to run through the Google Closure (no j in this case) compiler and have all the dead code removed. After that, you’re left with a very compact optimized file.
I think that is exactly why Dart, or any other full replacement for Javascript, is so tempting.
Javascript sucks a lot more than it should, which is why people are always trying to make it easier with things like jQuery and CoffeeScript. I think there is a great amount of merit to completely ditching the old and bringing in something new.
The fact that CoffeeScript is ok means you don’t need to ditch js to get tolerable language.
Just add optional type definitions to underlying js engine, and you can use a better language like CoffeeScript and have the code run fast, while retaining compatibility.
My point is that sometimes great things come from breaking compatibility. As nice as it may be, CoffeeScript is still just a crutch.
“not created here” syndrome i guess
Depends on the viewpoint, some don’t like CoffeeScript because it doesn’t have a ‘let’ or a ‘var’ for local scope and I guess that it has JavaScript view that “all number are floats” on this point I prefer Dart’s big ints.
Python and Ruby do just fine without let or var for local scope.
As for numeric model, CoffeeScript has no choice. It uses what Javascript provides, that’s why it can be translated so directly to JS. It’s a small price to pay for not needing a whole new Google specific VM.
JavaScript is the assembly language of the web. Dart is one of the many projects trying to build the C language of the web.
Edited 2011-10-14 14:24 UTC
So if this language takes Python as its role model and can be compiled to Javascript, why not just code in Python and use pyjamas?
http://pyjs.org
I ask this out of curiosity, as someone who does not do any web programming. I am interested in it, but I don’t want to have to learn one language on the client (javascript) and then another for the server (php/perl/etc).
There is not much python in it.
It looks more like a simplified C# and it looks like it has the functionality of Script#, except for less browser support and less tool support.
But it is still early days and it does look very promising.
Although I do some light JavaScript work, I never really spent the time learning the language expecting that one day it would either 1) be Replaced, or 2) improved upon.
So we have JQuery which is an improvement on the language, and now some alternatives such as C++ in the browser and this.
Though… close to every language (among those in active usage) one day will be either 1) Replaced, or 2) improved upon.
Maybe such is the reason for lots of (supposedly) shoddy JS around – enough people doing what you did / not bothering to learn its idiosyncrasies?
The code samples looked a lot like javascript with some new foundation class names.
I imagine that Dart will follow the same way as Google Wave.
We already have several compilers for current languages that compile to Javascript, why take a complete new language?
For me this is a kind of disappointment.
Free Dart Language ebook;
http://www.heronote.com/files/Dart.htm“