Domenic Denicola wrote:
The prototyping efforts are appreciated, but can rarely be used in a comfortable way. (Compared to, say, HTML5.)
Remember, HTML5 started in 2004 (WHATWG founding) and still isn't done. Eight years ago.
I've thought a lot about how to feasibly use Harmony features in real-world code, but have fallen down every time. Here are some of the stumbling blocks I've encountered: * Node.js with --harmony flag gets you collections, old proxies, and (significantly) block scoping. But Node does not make it easy to indicate "this file needs to be run with --harmony," or e.g. to require harmony-using files from non-harmony-using libraries. So this ends up being a nonstarter for library authors, leaving it only usable by application writers. Besides, the proxies are still old, which is really unfortunate.
That'll be fixed this year, soon I'm told.
And the iteration rate is slowww: stuff like destructuring has been harmonized for a long time, but shows no sign of making it into V8.
How would you see the signs? Just asking. I know the Munich team is going strong and they have skills. I don't know detailed schedule, but there is no need to presume inaction or action. Let's ask.
* The same problems apply to desktop apps written with Chromium Embedded Framework. These will probably have more app code, but then if you want to factor any of it out into smaller redistributable modules, you limit your audience. * SpiderMonkey has a lot of stuff that we would love to use, and a fairly fast iteration time. (Direct proxies are almost landed, according to my bugmail!) The spec is tracked pretty well, too. But SpiderMonkey has very little uptake outside of Firefox, and most code written for Firefox must be web-compatible, so nobody except Firefox extension authors gets to use its many features.
This is all true now, but with more balanced browser competition and IE10 coming along, next year is a different story.
If there were a way to make this go faster, I'd want it. I don't know of a way. Do you? Again, HTML5 isn't done, isn't totally cross-browser-consistent, and started 8 years ago.
Compilers do seem attractive, not only for ES6-prototyped to ES5, but for even more advanced/experimental languages (LLJS, for example). CoffeeScript is quite usable, too.
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