PureScript vs TypeScript

Overview

TypeScript

Stacks105.1K

Followers74.2K

Votes503

GitHub Stars106.6K

Forks13.1K

PureScript

Stacks88

Followers86

Votes18

GitHub Stars8.8K

Forks569

PureScript vs TypeScript: What are the differences?

Introduction

PureScript and TypeScript are two popular programming languages that are used for different purposes. While both languages have their similarities, there are some key differences between the two that set them apart. In this article, we will explore these differences and understand the unique features of each language.

Language Focus: PureScript is a purely functional programming language that is heavily influenced by Haskell. It is designed to be a strongly typed language with a focus on type inference and immutability. On the other hand, TypeScript is a superset of JavaScript that adds static typing to the dynamic language. It is primarily focused on improving the development experience of JavaScript developers by providing type checking and IDE features.
Tooling and Ecosystem: PureScript has a smaller ecosystem compared to TypeScript. While TypeScript benefits from its integration with existing JavaScript libraries and tools, PureScript has its own set of libraries and tools specifically built for the language. TypeScript has excellent support from industry-standard tools like Visual Studio Code and a large community dedicated to developing TypeScript libraries and frameworks.
Type Inference: PureScript has a powerful type inference system that can automatically deduce the types of expressions and functions. This allows developers to write code without explicitly annotating every type. In contrast, TypeScript's type inference system is not as powerful as PureScript. Developers are required to annotate types explicitly in some cases to ensure type safety.
Runtime Performance: PureScript compiles to highly efficient JavaScript code that can often outperform equivalent TypeScript code. This is because PureScript has a more fine-grained control over the generated JavaScript and can optimize it for performance. TypeScript, on the other hand, aims to provide a seamless development experience by prioritizing developer productivity over runtime performance.
Functional Programming Paradigm: PureScript is designed to be a functional programming language and enforces strict immutability and purity in its code. It provides powerful abstractions for handling functional programming concepts like monads and higher-order functions. While TypeScript does support functional programming features like lambdas and first-class functions, it is not as strict as PureScript in enforcing functional programming principles.
Maturity and Adoption: Although both PureScript and TypeScript have been around for a while, TypeScript has gained higher adoption and is widely used in the industry. TypeScript's close relationship with JavaScript and its ease of adoption have contributed to its popularity. PureScript, on the other hand, is more niche and is primarily used by developers who have a strong inclination towards functional programming.

In summary, PureScript is a purely functional programming language with a focus on type inference and immutability, while TypeScript is a statically typed superset of JavaScript aimed at improving the development experience. PureScript has a smaller ecosystem and better runtime performance, but TypeScript has a larger adoption and a more mature tooling and library ecosystem.

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Advice on TypeScript, PureScript

Peter

May 17, 2019

Reviewon

TypeScript

I use TypeScript because:

incredible developer tooling and community support
actively developed and supported by Microsoft (yes, I like Microsoft) ;)
easier to make sense of a TS codebase because the annotations provide so much more context than plain JS
refactors become easier (VSCode has superb support for TS)

I've switched back and forth between TS and Flow and decided a year ago to abandon Flow completely in favor of TS. I don't want to bash Flow, however, my main grievances are very poor tooling (editor integration leaves much to be desired), a slower release cycle, and subpar docs and community support.

135k views135k

Comments

Jarvis

May 16, 2019

Reviewon

TypeScript

Flow (JS)

I use TypeScript because it isn't just about validating the types I'm expecting to receive though that is a huge part of it too. Flow (JS) seems to be a type system only. TypeScript also allows you to use the latest features of JavaScript while also providing the type checking. To be fair to Flow (JS), I have not used it, but likely wouldn't have due to the additional features I get from TypeScript.

168k views168k

Comments

David

VP Engineering at Trolley

May 16, 2019

Reviewon

JavaScript

Flow (JS)

TypeScript

We originally (in 2017) started rewriting our platform from JavaScript to Flow (JS) but found the library support for Flow was lacking. After switching gears to TypeScript we've never looked back. At this point we're finding that frontend and backend libraries are supporting TypeScript out of the box and where the support is missing that the commuity is typically got a solution in hand.

173k views173k

Comments

Detailed Comparison

TypeScript	PureScript
TypeScript is a language for application-scale JavaScript development. It's a typed superset of JavaScript that compiles to plain JavaScript.	A small strongly typed programming language with expressive types that compiles to JavaScript, written in and inspired by Haskell.
Statistics
GitHub Stars 106.6K	GitHub Stars 8.8K
GitHub Forks 13.1K	GitHub Forks 569
Stacks 105.1K	Stacks 88
Followers 74.2K	Followers 86
Votes 503	Votes 18
Pros & Cons
Pros 173 More intuitive and type safe javascript 105 Type safe 80 JavaScript superset 48 The best AltJS ever 27 Best AltJS for BackEnd Cons 5 Code may look heavy and confusing 4 Hype	Pros 6 Purely functional 4 Great FFI to JavaScript 2 Alternate backends 2 The best type system 1 Coherent type classes Cons 1 No JSX/Template 1 Have Some Bugs 1 Not so fancy error reporting

What are some alternatives to TypeScript, PureScript?

JavaScript

JavaScript is most known as the scripting language for Web pages, but used in many non-browser environments as well such as node.js or Apache CouchDB. It is a prototype-based, multi-paradigm scripting language that is dynamic,and supports object-oriented, imperative, and functional programming styles.

Python

Python is a general purpose programming language created by Guido Van Rossum. Python is most praised for its elegant syntax and readable code, if you are just beginning your programming career python suits you best.

PHP

Fast, flexible and pragmatic, PHP powers everything from your blog to the most popular websites in the world.

Ruby

Ruby is a language of careful balance. Its creator, Yukihiro “Matz” Matsumoto, blended parts of his favorite languages (Perl, Smalltalk, Eiffel, Ada, and Lisp) to form a new language that balanced functional programming with imperative programming.

Java

Java is a programming language and computing platform first released by Sun Microsystems in 1995. There are lots of applications and websites that will not work unless you have Java installed, and more are created every day. Java is fast, secure, and reliable. From laptops to datacenters, game consoles to scientific supercomputers, cell phones to the Internet, Java is everywhere!

Golang

Go is expressive, concise, clean, and efficient. Its concurrency mechanisms make it easy to write programs that get the most out of multicore and networked machines, while its novel type system enables flexible and modular program construction. Go compiles quickly to machine code yet has the convenience of garbage collection and the power of run-time reflection. It's a fast, statically typed, compiled language that feels like a dynamically typed, interpreted language.

HTML5

HTML5 is a core technology markup language of the Internet used for structuring and presenting content for the World Wide Web. As of October 2014 this is the final and complete fifth revision of the HTML standard of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C). The previous version, HTML 4, was standardised in 1997.

C#

C# (pronounced "See Sharp") is a simple, modern, object-oriented, and type-safe programming language. C# has its roots in the C family of languages and will be immediately familiar to C, C++, Java, and JavaScript programmers.

Meteor

A Meteor application is a mix of JavaScript that runs inside a client web browser, JavaScript that runs on the Meteor server inside a Node.js container, and all the supporting HTML fragments, CSS rules, and static assets.

Scala

Scala is an acronym for “Scalable Language”. This means that Scala grows with you. You can play with it by typing one-line expressions and observing the results. But you can also rely on it for large mission critical systems, as many companies, including Twitter, LinkedIn, or Intel do. To some, Scala feels like a scripting language. Its syntax is concise and low ceremony; its types get out of the way because the compiler can infer them.

Related Comparisons

PureScript vs TypeScript: What are the differences?

Introduction

Language Focus: PureScript is a purely functional programming language that is heavily influenced by Haskell. It is designed to be a strongly typed language with a focus on type inference and immutability. On the other hand, TypeScript is a superset of JavaScript that adds static typing to the dynamic language. It is primarily focused on improving the development experience of JavaScript developers by providing type checking and IDE features.
Tooling and Ecosystem: PureScript has a smaller ecosystem compared to TypeScript. While TypeScript benefits from its integration with existing JavaScript libraries and tools, PureScript has its own set of libraries and tools specifically built for the language. TypeScript has excellent support from industry-standard tools like Visual Studio Code and a large community dedicated to developing TypeScript libraries and frameworks.
Type Inference: PureScript has a powerful type inference system that can automatically deduce the types of expressions and functions. This allows developers to write code without explicitly annotating every type. In contrast, TypeScript's type inference system is not as powerful as PureScript. Developers are required to annotate types explicitly in some cases to ensure type safety.
Runtime Performance: PureScript compiles to highly efficient JavaScript code that can often outperform equivalent TypeScript code. This is because PureScript has a more fine-grained control over the generated JavaScript and can optimize it for performance. TypeScript, on the other hand, aims to provide a seamless development experience by prioritizing developer productivity over runtime performance.
Functional Programming Paradigm: PureScript is designed to be a functional programming language and enforces strict immutability and purity in its code. It provides powerful abstractions for handling functional programming concepts like monads and higher-order functions. While TypeScript does support functional programming features like lambdas and first-class functions, it is not as strict as PureScript in enforcing functional programming principles.
Maturity and Adoption: Although both PureScript and TypeScript have been around for a while, TypeScript has gained higher adoption and is widely used in the industry. TypeScript's close relationship with JavaScript and its ease of adoption have contributed to its popularity. PureScript, on the other hand, is more niche and is primarily used by developers who have a strong inclination towards functional programming.

PureScript vs TypeScript

Overview