This book is a quick and useful guide to learning the TypeScript language. The language features that TypeScript provides on top of JavaScript are covered thoroughly in this book with hands-on examples. TypeScript is a fairly new development language that can ease the pain of normal JavaScript development. Starting from downloading the compiler, covering language features, and implementing a dynamic application, this book will leave you ready to create new, large-scale JavaScript-based applications.
Chapter 1, Getting Started with TypeScript, covers setting up an environment for developing TypeScript applications and creating a simple application.
Chapter 2, TypeScript Basics, covers the primary language features that TypeScript creates on top of JavaScript and how each of these features compiles into plain JavaScript.
Chapter 3, The TypeScript Compiler, examines the TypeScript compiler and the different parameters that it accepts. The results of the different parameters will be discussed as well as how they affect the final JavaScript output.
Chapter 4, Object-oriented Programming with TypeScript, is all about the basics of object-oriented programming. You will be presented with the benefits that TypeScript adds to make ECMA Script a more full-fledged object-oriented language.
Chapter 5, Creating a Simple Drawing Application, walks you through creating a simple drawing application using the concepts already covered in the book. By the end of the chapter, you will have created a web-based drawing application that will give you a good understanding of writing complex applications using TypeScript.
Chapter 6, Declaration Files and Library Integrations, discusses declaration files and how they help us integrate with other JavaScript libraries. Libraries such as jQuery, KnockoutJS, and RequireJS will be covered.
Chapter 7, Enhancing the Drawing Application, re-examines the drawing application and shows you how to create a more reusable set of objects. Module definitions will be created and the process of minifying code is covered.
Chapter 8, Debugging TypeScript, discusses the different options available to debug TypeScript once it is deployed and running. We also cover unit testing and test-driven development, which will allow us to test functionality with code.
TypeScript has a standalone compiler install, so any text editor can be used to develop TypeScript applications. The examples provided with this book will use Microsoft's Visual Studio, and it is recommended that you use it too to help you follow the examples; however, this is not a requirement. A basic understanding of JavaScript and web development is required as not every language construct will be covered; just the ones that TypeScript provides on top of it.
This book is intended to introduce the TypeScript language and its features to anyone looking to develop rich web applications. Whether you are new to web development or are an experienced engineer with strong JavaScript skills, this book will get you writing code quickly. A basic understanding of JavaScript and its language features is necessary for this book.
In this book, you will find a number of styles of text that distinguish between different kinds of information. Here are some examples of these styles, and an explanation of their meaning.
Code words in text, database table names, folder names, filenames, file extensions, pathnames, dummy URLs, user input, and Twitter handles are shown as follows: "To get started, let's create a new file on the filesystem and call it HelloWorld.ts."
A block of code is set as follows:
var p = document.createElement('p');
var hello: string = "Hello";
var world: string = 2;
p.textContent = hello + " " + world;
document.body.appendChild(p);Any command-line input or output is written as follows:
tsc HelloWorld.ts
New terms and important words are shown in bold. Words that you see on the screen, in menus or dialog boxes for example, appear in the text like this: "To create a new project that includes TypeScript, go to the File menu and navigate to New | Project."
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