JavaScript Vs TypeScript: An Amazing Battle With Facts

Reading Time: 5 minutes

We are living in an age of technology. Wherever you see, you will find gadgets that make your life easy, but sometimes they destroy it too, depends on how you use them. Internet is the thing that makes our daily life less miserable.

The Internet has the solution to most of the problems that an ordinary person faces in everyday life. You can get a doctor’s appointment or get a degree by just studying online and whatnot.

But have you ever thought about how all these web pages work, how they are made, and what is used in making them?

The answer is these unique websites that we see on our screens are built using various programming languages like JavaScript, HTML, etc. These websites need a lot of time and hard work to work the way we see them.

Two coding languages used in making these programming languages are JavaScript and TypeScript. We will discuss these two and will get to know how they are different from each other.

About JavaScript

JavaScript is also known as JS, is a dynamic programming language. Dynamic programming stands for high-level programming languages that execute many programming tasks at run time that a static programming language performs during compilation.

JavaScript is known as a high-level programming language because it is used in developing web pages. JavaScript is run on the browser along with Html. JavaScript is embedded in Html and is interpreted by the browser during the run time. In November 1996, JavaScript was submitted to ECMA (European Computer Manufacturers Association). CommonJS was launched in 2009 to provide a common standard library.

Many JavaScript development companies hire JavaScript developers to develop websites. JavaScript, along with Html and a database language like MySQL, is used to make webpages and is in high demand these days. Since everything is getting online, and no businessmen want to be left behind by their competitors.

History of JavaScript

Now you know what JavaScript is, so now it is time that you know about its history and who developed it.

Netscape communications corporation programmer, Brendan Eich, is the one who developed the programming language that we now know as JavaScript. In September 1995, it was introduced for the first time under the name Mocha.

After its success as a scripting tool, Mocha has renamed JavaScript; this was done to reflect Netscape’s java support.

About TypeScript

TypeScript is the word that every programmer who knows JavaScript has heard at least once. This is because TypeScript is the superset of JavaScript. Microsoft is the company that developed it. Microsoft made it public in October 2012. It took Microsoft 2 years to build it. Optional static typing is added to the language.

TypeScript is the superset of JavaScript which means that all existing JavaScript programs are TypeScript programs. By changing the file extension of a JavaScript file from .js to .ts, you convert JavaScript to TypeScript.

Some features of TypeScript are:

• Every JavaScript program is also a TypeScript program, i.e., any JavaScript file can be renamed to .ts and can be compiled
• TypeScript is the superset of JavaScript that can reuse existing JavaScript frameworks, tools, and libraries. It also supports other JS libraries.
• TypeScript can run across platforms, unlike JavaScript that needs a dedicated VM.
• TypeScript is strongly typed and comes with optional static typing.
• It supports object-oriented programming like classes, inheritance, etc.
• TypeScript is not directly sent to the browser, this is because the browser cannot understand TypeScript, so it is first converted into JavaScript and then sent to the browser. The process of converting TypeScript code to JavaScript is known as Trans-piled.

History of TypeScript

Microsoft introduced TypeScript in October 2012. It took Microsoft 2 years of internal development under the Apache 2 license before it was released. A TypeScript is an open-source, object-oriented programming language.

To compile a TypeScript file, a separate compiler is needed. The browser is unable to process TypeScript, and so it is not run directly on the browser. The TypeScript source file has a .ts file extension. In April 2019 latest version of TypeScript was launched.

Difference between JavaScript and TypeScript

There are many differences between JavaScript and TypeScript. Here are some of those:

• TypeScript is an object-oriented programming language; unlike TypeScript, JavaScript is a scripting language.
• TypeScript is more advanced and has a feature known as static typing, whereas JavaScript has dynamic typing.
• TypeScript supports modules, whereas JavaScript does not support modules.
• TypeScript has an interface, but JavaScript does not have an interface.
• TypeScript has a file extension of .ts whereas JavaScript has a file extension of .js.
• JavaScript is run directly on the browser, and all the errors appear only on the browser. Therefore, if you want to see the errors, you need to first run it on the browser. Whereas TypeScript is not run directly on the browser, and the errors are pointed out at the time of development only. So the number of errors that appear during the run time is less.
• JavaScript does not support generics, whereas TypeScript supports generics.
• JavaScript does not support optional parameters, whereas TypeScript supports optional parameters.
• In JavaScript numbers, strings are objects, whereas, in TypeScript, numbers and strings are interfaces.

I hope that the difference between JavaScript and TypeScript is clear to you. Now, let’s look at the advantages of TypeScript over JavaScript:

Advantages of  TypeScript over JavaScript

There are many advantages of using TypeScript over JavaScript. Some of those advantages are:

• In JavaScript, the errors are seen during the run time only. After getting the error, you need to go back and rectify the error and rerun it to see if the error is solved. In contrast, TypeScript points out compilation errors when writing the program, so the number of errors faced during run time is reduced.
• JavaScript is not a strongly typed programming language and supports dynamic typing, whereas TypeScript is strongly typed and supports static typing. This means that it allows for checking type correctness at compile time.
• TypeScript is the superset of JavaScript i.e.; TypeScript is JavaScript with additional features. It is possible that your target browser does not support it, but the TypeScript compiler can compile the .ts files into ES3, ES4, and ES5.
• TypeScript has very nice tooling support with IntelliSense, which provides hints as the code is written.

Disadvantages of TypeScript over JavaScript

TypeScript is the superset of JavaScript, but still, there are a few points on which TypeScript lacks:

• TypeScript takes a longer time to compile as compared to JavaScript.
• TypeScript does not support abstract classes.
• TypeScript doesn’t run directly on the browser. First, a compilation step is required to convert it from TypeScript to JavaScript.

Why was TypeScript developed when JavaScript was already there?

JavaScript Development Company launched JavaScript as a client-side programming language, but soon developers got to know JavaScript’s application as the server-side programming language.

This led to the usage of JavaScript as the server-side programming language. However, time codes become complex and heavy. Due to these disadvantages, JavaScript was not deemed fit to be used as an object-oriented programming language.

This is why JavaScript could not work as a server-side programming language, which led to the development of TypeScript programming.

CONCLUSION

I hope that after reading this article, you were able to differentiate between JavaScript and TypeScript. I think learning both TypeScript and JavaScript is essential. It is because JavaScript is the base that JavaScript development companies look for in their developers. However, to fulfill the growing complex demands of server-side programming of their clients, they also hire JavaScript developers who are also well-versed in TypeScript. Thus, in my opinion, both languages are necessary and have equal importance in developing a web page. But, JavaScript is the basic that you must master to move to the next level.

Read Alos:Top 5 PWA Frameworks and Libraries to use in 2021