CoffeeScript 1.7 is shaping up to be a pretty kick-ass release with significant improvements. Here are the ones I'm most excited about, in order of my own excitement.
Parentheses-free chaining
https://github.com/jashkenas/coffee-script/pull/3263
Years of being wished for, finally granted!
result = range 1, 3
.concat range 4, 6
.map (x) -> x * x
.filter (x) -> x % 2 is 0
console.log result # [4, 16, 36]$ 'body'
.click (e) ->
$ '.box'
.fadeIn 'fast'
.addClass '.active'
.css 'marginRight', '10px'Proper multiline strings
These two both solve roughly the same problem:
https://github.com/jashkenas/coffee-script/pull/3246
https://github.com/jashkenas/coffee-script/pull/3256
These'll finally let you wrap long strings (e.g. user-facing messages) without breaking your code's indentation, or manually stripping newlines out. I've been wanting these for so long!
if true
if not false
console.log 'Hello world.
This is a long line of text
that I’d like split in my code.'
# equivalent to:
if true
if not false
console.log 'Hello world. This is a long line of text that I’d like split in my code.'console.log '''
By default, prefixed CSS will rewrite original files.
If you didn't set input files, autoprefixer will \
read from stdin stream.
Output CSS will be written to stdout stream on \
`-o -' argument or stdin input.
'''
# equivalent to:
desc = '''
By default, prefixed CSS will rewrite original files.
If you didn't set input files, autoprefixer will read from stdin stream.
Output CSS will be written to stdout stream on `-o -' argument or stdin input.
'''Expansion in array destructuring
https://github.com/jashkenas/coffee-script/pull/3268
The name sounds confusing, but this is straightforward:
# to get the first and last, what you have to do today:
[first, middle..., last] = array
# what you can do now:
[first, ..., last] = arrayBut here's the killer use for it:
# what you have to do today to get the last element in an array:
last = array[array.length - 1]
# or if you, like me, like to use features to their fullest:
[last] = array[-1..]
# what you can do now:
[..., last] = arrayNew mathematical operators
https://github.com/jashkenas/coffee-script/pull/2887
- Power operator
** - Floor division operator
// - Correct modulo operator
%%(respects negatives)
I remember wishing for each one of these when I worked on Seadragon Ajax!
Whitespace escaping in heregexes
https://github.com/jashkenas/coffee-script/pull/3214
Not a huge deal to most people, but I've frequently wondered about this.
regex = /// <link\ href="#{URL}" ///
Proper require.extensions registration
https://github.com/jashkenas/coffee-script/pull/3279
Like Streamline.js and others, extending Node's require() to automatically compile CoffeeScript files is now an explicit action. This now prevents versioning conflicts, etc. with nested local CoffeeScript dependencies.
# if you're working with the compiler programmatically:
CoffeeScript = require 'coffee-script'
CoffeeScript.register()
# or, e.g. for Mocha configuration
require 'coffee-script/register'
coffee <dir> executes index.coffee now
https://github.com/jashkenas/coffee-script/pull/3292
Like the title says. This brings the coffee executable closer in line with node. There's still a little room for improvement (e.g. if your main file is named app.coffee), but this is already a great step forward.
Credits
Phew! Talk about a powerful list.
My undying gratitute to the contributors of the above pull requests. A special shout-out to @xixixao in particular for contributing about half of them! Thank you all very, very much.
Looking forward to CoffeeScript 1.7!
Great! But still there are some goodies missing for some reason: