Does anyone else think haXe is kind of pointless?

[mattkenefick]

You can't do 3D in PHP. You can't do cURL in Flash. You can't do server-side with Javascript without a PHP file.

So why are we combining all these into a "single language" if most of the methods are different anyway?

For sake of array functions and such? I don't really think its a big deal to know that PHP has array_push versus Array.push();

Is there really a point for this ?

[ianxm]

the target platforms don't entirely overlap, but there is a lot of overlap in programs written for these platforms. haxe offers a small standard library that you can use on all targets, while allowing the use of the full library specific to that platform.

[mattkenefick]

I know they don't overlap entirely... But I feel that this haXe deal is a big waste of efforts. It's just adding another layer.

Having a standardized Math or XML library isn't really killing me when I program.
Standardizing Math.sin(); and sin(); isn't helpful...

I just fail to see the actual benefit.. Have I not read deep enough into it?

[JLM]

haXe is not a commercial transient programming language and does not reinvent components for commercial cycles.

have you seen 3d sandy running on an iphone in javascript.. and in the future in silverlight on your blackbury?

Did you want flash interactive control on any platform?

Do you want your logic to be running in the right place or should company politics put it in the wrong place and have 3 hackers rather than one.

[mattkenefick]

Originally Posted by JLM

haXe is not a commercial transient programming language and does not reinvent components for commercial cycles.

have you seen 3d sandy running on an iphone in javascript.. and in the future in silverlight on your blackbury?

Did you want flash interactive control on any platform?

Do you want your logic to be running in the right place or should company politics put it in the wrong place and have 3 hackers rather than one.

I try not to associate myself with the iPhone.

I'm not sure what the rest of this has to do with using haXe. Logic running in the right place has what to do with company politics and programmers?

[JLM]

Macromedia Generator is a good example of a powerful flash technology that disappeared over night, that is the reality of Commercial languages they don't evolve they reinvent themselves from scratch. Look at how Basic has evolved against opensource language like Ruby or Python. How much of your AS2 code do you use recode for AS3, what a waste of energy? FLEX or XAML do either have a long term future? Languages tend to have problem domains, haXe is designed for the web, but I can see it spreading.

Recently I read about a haxe physics engine being compiled as C++, this and screenweaverHX seem far better approaches than 'air'. Why limit your code to one arena, flash is good at rapid interfaces development but if haxe is fairly interchangeable then you can spruce up desktop apps.

Better programming languages make it easier to produce less, more efficient and maintainable code in less time, if this was not true why would anyone ever use Ruby? I looked at PHP it's a mess of a language why would I learn that when I can create complex PHP applications from haXe applying my actionscript skills and maybe even some functional programming concepts.

My experience is that, as a Flash developer I have had to process data that should be provided in a suitable format. Java programmers getting us to scrap html and pass it through via flashvars, meh, if we all coded the same language it would be so much easier to get sense out of them and there would never be a 'serious' coder and actionscripter attitude split, with a single language you can have better communication between sections and organisation of the system as a single application, with MVC structures crossing traditionally separate parts.

Using one language means that ideas used in one target are now considered in other targets.

Client asks for a flash game you code it in haXe, and you compile several versions for different flash players the user runs game, "You have an old flash player, upgrade if you want game to run smoother".

Client gets a state of the art flash game but with large player matrix, I think the term is degrading gracefully.

I don't see a reason not to use Flash IDE for graphics, but haXe seems to have more milage than actionscript. I am unsure if it would always be
the best choice for php and javascript though

[grumpytoad]

Originally Posted by mattkenefick

I'm not sure what the rest of this has to do with using haXe. Logic running in the right place has what to do with company politics and programmers?

The direction of development for a language is often influenced by politics, just look at Java or C#.

HaXe has some benefits over the other languages: stricter typing allows for less bugs and better structures, plus free documentation.

If you run the haXe PHP target, you can start with a cheap hosting company.. Once you start getting traffic and developers you can switch to the faster neko target, and put the data-crunching parts as a CPP target, with little to no development overhead.

You can make more optimisation on the haxe flash target than the AS3 target, due to native Integers and fast iterative classes (like haxe.FastList), and since ES4 is scrapped, you'll be waiting a while for a robust type system on javascript.

So get cracking on some code, you won't turn back.

[JLM]

Haxe has the Alchemy bytecodes so can potentially run faster than normally created flash, every day it gets more points!

[JLM]

I have been using/learning haxe.. and I am now beginning to think the question should really be:

Does anyone else think coding AS3 is kind of pointless?


I mean its not a big leap to haXe from AS3 and probably not from AS2 if your just working with flash. So if you divorce graphics and code I do not see the advantage of AS3 apart from the larger user base.

For instance if I load a movie into the same ApplicationDomain I can create a new instances from the loaded movie by its name and cast it to MovieClip

var mc: MovieClip       = cast( Type.createInstance( Type.resolveClass( nom ), new Array() ), MovieClip);

Notice the use of the generic 'Type' class, now this looks messy, but doing this in AS3 is more messy, but in AS3 I have to use flash specific and less logical constructs, my mind is constrained to think always in flash terms, haxe allows me to think more in terms of general code and not get too caught up in code that will be useless in flash 11! It also helps me see areas of flash that are ugly and I can package them so that I can work in more general platform unspecific terms.

Haxe also has interesting lightweight structures that allow for cases that are marginal for class such as typeDef and enum.

I understand why you might consider using flex but AS3... can't really see it, haxe just opens up so many more future options. I am working on some work flows, soon I will put together a tutorial that may help you with switching to haxe.

Pointless? Not really.

Is haXe sort of dead? Very much, just look at the number of people viewing this forum.