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Gnome Goes JavaScript

Posted by timothy on from the hola-world dept.

mikejuk writes "Much to most programmers' shock and dismay Gnome has made JavaScript its main language for apps. It will still support other languages and it still supports C for libraries, but for apps it is JavaScript that rules. JavaScript seems to be a good choice for Gnome 3, as the shell UI is written in the language. It is also consistent with the use of JavaScript in WinRT, Chrome Apps, and FirefoxOS apps, and generally the rise of web apps. As you might expect, the initial reactions are of horror at the idea that JavaScript has been selected rather than the favorite language of the commenter. There is a great deal of ignorance about (and prejudice against) JavaScript, which is often regarded as an incomplete toy language rather than the elegant and sparse language that it actually is."

4 of 387 comments (clear)

  1. Read more facts here by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    Read more about the reasoning and decisionprocess here:

    http://treitter.livejournal.com/14871.html

    1. Re:Read more facts here by MrEricSir · · Score: 5, Informative

      What the summary seems to be leaving out is this: Javascript will be the language they suggest n00bs who want to learn Gnome programming start with.

      That's really the only change being made here. They're not re-writing apps in Javascript, they're not removing existing language support. This is purely an advisory statement for first-time Gnome programmers.

      --
      There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
  2. There shall be only one? by mike.mondy · · Score: 5, Informative

    From the TFA and the blog linked from the TFA:

    During the GNOME Developer Experience Hackfest this week, one of the major goals we identified was the need to pick a *single* language to give a simple answer to "how do I write a GNOME app?". [emphasis added]

    Why only one?

    * It allows us to focus when we write developer documentation, fixing bugs in the development environment and the development of tools. This reduces our maintanence costs and enables us to be vastly more efficient.
    * It enables code and knowledge sharing to occur, so that people can easily copy and paste code from existing applications, or find information about common problems and challenges.
    * It provide a coherent and easy-to-follow path for new developers.
    * It allows us to include the full GNOME framework within the language itself.

    But also:

    We will continue to write documentation for other languages, but we will also prioritize JavaScript when deciding what to work on.

    I wonder how much harder it would be to support LUA, python, tcl, and some of the other common languages. Or whatever comes next...

  3. Re:They should have gone with Python by Dcnjoe60 · · Score: 5, Informative

    Python is a language which makes app writing very easy. It's very easy to write, read, debug. It's also very fast when used right or modified.

    This decision in my opinion is one of the boneheaded decisions which will be Gnomes final nail on the coffin. They had a chance to rule the Linux desktop with Ubuntu and since Gnome 3.0 have threw it all away. Everything that made Gnome great with the 2x series seems to have been lost at 3x and their release schedule is so slow that we are probably going to be stuck on 3x for 10 years. Goodbye Gnome and welcome back KDE.

    You are welcome to your opinion, but since gnome-shell is written in JS and most new developers want to work on things that tie into gnome-shell, it seems to make a lot of sense to steer them to JS. If you took the time to actually read what the gnome developers are putting forward, you would find that they are officially recommending JS for new developers who are looking how to quickly become productive in developing for gnome. They are still fully supporting c (libraries still are in c) python, vala and any other language that has bindings to the gnome libraries.

    Obviously, if you are a C programmer, you will probably continue to program in C, even in gnome. That is, unless you want to write extensions for gnome-shell, in which case, you will program in JS as that is the language gnome-shell is written in. The same is true for C++, python or any other language.

    Once people get past the knee-jerk reaction to the work "javascript" and look at what gnome developers are proposing, it makes a lot of sense. Basically, they realize the entry bar to developing in gnome is quite high, so since so much of gnome already uses JS they are going to make tutorials for beginning developers on how to use JS to develop for gnome and recommend new developers use JS to develop for gnome. Experienced developers, or any developer for that matter, are still free to use any language they want.