Microsoft is one step closer to developing a programming language that goes beyond JavaScript. The company has announced the availability of TypeScript 2.0, its typed superset of JavaScript.
“TypeScript 1.0 had successfully shown developers the potential of JavaScript when combined with static types. Compile-time error checking saved countless hours of bug hunting, and TypeScript’s editor tools gave developers a huge productivity boost as they began building larger and larger JavaScript apps. However, to be a full superset of the most popular and widespread language in the world, TypeScript still had some growing to do,” wrote Daniel Rosenwasser, program manager for TypeScript.
Version 2.0 of the programming language features alignment with ECMAScript, support for JavaScript libraries and tools, and other new features. The biggest features of the release include tagged unions, glob support in tsconfig, non-nullable types, and control flow analyzed types.
(Related: Angular 2 adds TypeScript)
The company plans to evolve the language’s type system, improve its language service, and provide smart tools next.
“TypeScript is JavaScript that scales,” the team wrote. “Starting from the same syntax and semantics that millions of JavaScript developers know today, TypeScript allows developers to use existing JavaScript code, incorporate popular JavaScript libraries, and call TypeScript code from JavaScript. TypeScript’s optional static types enable JavaScript developers to use highly-productive development tools and practices like static checking and code refactoring when developing JavaScript applications.”
Developers can download the latest version via TypeScript 2.0 for Visual Studio 2015 or NuGet, or start using it in Visual Studio Code.
