What is CoffeeScript?

To quote the official website:

CoffeeScript is a little language that compiles into JavaScript. Underneath all of those embarrassing braces and semicolons, JavaScript has always had a gorgeous object model at its heart. CoffeeScript is an attempt to expose the good parts of JavaScript in a simple way.

The golden rule of CoffeeScript is: "It's just JavaScript". The code compiles one-to-one into the equivalent JS, and there is no interpretation at runtime. You can use any existing JavaScript library seamlessly (and vice-versa). The compiled output is readable and pretty-printed, passes through JavaScript Lint without warnings, will work in every JavaScript implementation, and tends to run as fast or faster than the equivalent handwritten JavaScript.

So CoffeeScript is a great way to more concisely and nicely write JavaScript! Recently CoffeeScript was included in the Ruby on Rails framework as the default way of writing JavaScript and through this has gained considerable attention recently. Well deserved we at Mindscape think!

Getting Started

The Mindscape Web Workbench includes all the capabilities you need to start writing CoffeeScript in Visual Studio. Simply follow our getting started guide and you'll be up and running in no time. CoffeeScript being a simplified version of JavaScript does mean there is a little more to learn but there is a lot of places to learn about CoffeeScript!

Learning more

The official website for CoffeeScript is a great place to start

The CoffeeScript Wiki is also handy