1. Transpiling

• Babel
  • Standardized JS
  • Leverage full JS Ecosystem
  • experimental features earlier
  • No type defs, annotations required
  • Test, lint, great libs
• Typescript
  • Superset of Javascript
  • Enhanced AutoCompletion
  • Safer refactoring
  • Clearer intent
  • Additional non-standard features like interface
• Elm
  • Compiles down to JS
  • Clean Syntax
  • Immutable data structures
  • Friendly errors
  • All errors are compile-time errors
  • Interops with JS

1.1. Babel for nodejs

.babelrc:

{
  "presets": [
    // "env",
    // "react"
    "latest"
  ]
}

Use babel-node buildScripts/startMessage instead of node buildScripts/startMessage so node.js can use import new features.