Deno is competing against Node.js, which is MIT-licensed. Deno is arguably better, but it would have to be _so much better_ to get people to even give it a second look if it was commercial.
I think this is one of the reasons why cloud computing monoliths like AWS are so successful. It's way easier to set up a $50/month VM on AWS then to get permission to spend $5/month on a VM elsewhere.
Unless you have a ridiculously good relationship with a handful of organizations or a perfect system for fitting into existing infrastructures, it's a big mistake to care about selling something to those organizations.
AWS is popular because it's free for companies with a high potential for getting big (like YC companies) and they can absorb the costs of the sales cycle.
Really ? I can think of QT - but that's such a huge body of work with some very specific use cases in which it doesn't really have competition (aside from DOM based shell for UI maybe, but that has it's own problems and is often a hassle to get working).
In this case Node is established, Deno is going to have an up hill battle to gain that mindshare on equal footing, adding a licensing restriction would probably kill it off the ground.
Can anyone name a few that come to mind?
I only know about one (Qt: GPLv2/3 or LGPLv3), but I don't use a lot of commercial software. Interestingly, Qt looks about 233 USD per month per seat!
1: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1_WvwHl7BXUPmoiSeD8G83JmS...
I do find the messaging to be confusing, because what would you think I meant if I talked about the runtime of Elixir or Scala?
This is the marketing line on the front page of the Deno project:
> A secure runtime for JavaScript and TypeScript.
They are using the same term "runtime" to describe JS as well as TS. All replies here by Deno team members use the language "Typescript support" but nobody here is saying TypeScript runtime.
To me "TypeScript runtime" means running TypeScript in a mode that runs faster than JavaScript by actually using the type info to generate better machine code. It does not mean translating to JavaScript at runtime and running in V8.
For example at one time there was an experimental version of Chrome that had a Dart Runtime. A quick google finds this HN thread when they decided NOT to have a dart runtime
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9264531
So can we get clear? Does Deno plan to execute TypeScript natively (not via V8 or via a heavily modified V8) or are the plans to continue compiling TypeScript to JavaScript internally and actually just run JavaScript
This is the marketing line on the front page of the Deno project:
> A secure runtime for JavaScript and TypeScript.
They are using the same term "runtime" to describe JS as well as TS. All replies here by Deno team members use the language "Typescript support" but nobody here is saying TypeScript runtime.
https://startfunction.com/deno-will-stop-using-typescript/
It featured on HN some time back:
This is the marketing line on the front page of the Deno project:
> A secure runtime for JavaScript and TypeScript.
They are using the same term "runtime" to describe JS as well as TS. All replies here by Deno team members use the language "Typescript support" but nobody here is saying TypeScript runtime.
Hence the implied step that TS needs to first be transpiled to JS before getting executed in the runtime was always in the back of my head and I'm guessing this is the way most people think as well.
And from a black-box perspective, whether TS first gets transpiled to JS or run directly doesn't make a difference. In that sense one could argue that it is a "TS runtime". This is a petty semantics-fight I don't want to get into though and I've probably already said too much :).
If you are interested in something that gets close to a TS runtime though, have a look at AssemblyScript [0]. It compiles to WASM and tries to keep most of the syntax of TS. Very interesting project imo.
> Deno is a runtime for JavaScript and TypeScript that is based on the V8 JavaScript engine and the Rust programming language.
We've simply incorporated the type-checking and transpiling steps into the deno cli, making it super simple to get going, no config needed.
> A secure runtime for JavaScript and TypeScript.
Shouldn't require caveats, with the caveat being that there is no runtime for TS.
There is reason to believe that the extra information given from TS typings could be carried into runtime wins, and so there is absolutely pent up demand for an actual TS runtime.