Skip to content
healeycodes.com·

💡TypeScript Could Soon Have Go's Defer Statement

TypeScript Might Get Go’s Defer Syntax

TL;DR

TypeScript could soon adopt Go's defer statement, making cleanup easier. The ECMAScript proposal offers an alternative approach.

The TypeScript community is discussing adding a Go-like defer statement to make resource management cleaner and more intuitive. This would allow developers to delay function execution until the surrounding function completes, similar to how it works in Go. Why should you care? If you're using TypeScript for complex applications with lots of cleanup logic, this could streamline your codebase significantly. The actual implementation involves teaching tsc's parser that defer is a statement and performing AST-to-AST transformations.

Key Points

1

The TypeScript compiler (tsc) needs updates for the new syntax, including parser changes (20 words)

2

A DeferStatement takes a single expression operand and has checks ensuring it appears inside function bodies (35 words)

3

In Go, defer captures callee, receiver, and argument values immediately when execution reaches the statement (35 words)

4

Even if callable methods are redefined after defer statements, original methods are still invoked (30 words)

5

The ECMAScript Explicit Resource Management proposal offers an alternative approach to resource management in JS (28 words)

Why It Matters

If you're using TypeScript for complex applications with lots of cleanup logic, this could streamline your codebase significantly. The actual transformation involves teaching tsc's parser that defer is a statement and performing AST-to-AST transformations. However, some argue it doesn't belong in the language.

TypeScriptGodefer statementresource managementECMAScript

Frequently Asked Questions

Why does this matter?

If you're using TypeScript for complex applications with lots of cleanup logic, this could streamline your codebase significantly. The actual transformation involves teaching tsc's parser that defer is a statement and performing AST-to-AST transformations. However, some argue it doesn't belong in the language.

What happened?

TypeScript could soon adopt Go's defer statement, making cleanup easier. The ECMAScript proposal offers an alternative approach.

Comments

Subscribe to join the conversation...

Be the first to comment

Enjoyed this article?

Get it daily. 7am. Free. Reads in 5 minutes.

Join 2,576 builders reading daily.