ECMAScript 6 (ES6) still sounds like something from the future. After all, it will only become a standard by mid 2015. However, its features are continually appearing in browsers and there are compilers that translate ES6 code to ES5 code. The latter is already a compelling solution, because the ECMAScript 6 feature set is already frozen.

This blog post gives a brief overview of ECMAScript 6 features and describes tools that enable you to use them today.

There are two ways to call methods in JavaScript:

• via dispatch, e.g. obj.someMethod(arg0, arg1)
• directly, e.g. someFunc.call(thisValue, arg0, arg1)

This blog post explains how these two work and why you will rarely call methods directly in ECMAScript 6.

A key feature of AngularJS 2.0 is its support for Web Components [^1]. Google’s Polymer is a Web Component polyfill (enabling them on all current browsers) and a framework on top of Web Components. This blog post describes how the Angular team sees the roles of AngularJS and Polymer.

The roles, according to the AngularJS team  #

AngularJS 2.0 team member Rob Eisenberg recently explained the relationship between AngularJS and Polymer:

Are you a programmer who is considering learning JavaScript, but unsure whether it is worth the pain? Then this blog post is for you: I argue that it is worth it and give tips for surviving the language.

Facebook’s React has an optional language extension that enables you to embed HTML inside JavaScript. This extension can make your code more concise, but it also breaks compatibility with the rest of the JavaScript ecosystem. ECMAScript 6 will have template strings [^1], which enable you to implement JSX (or something close to it) inside the language. Jonathan Raphaelson has done so and the result looks as follows.

The videos of the Google I/O 2014 talks have been online for a while now. Three of them are about Web Components and Polymer. This blog post briefly describes what they are about and mentions a few highlights, which may help you to decide which videos you want to watch.

I traveled quite a bit recently and got exposed to a negative aspect of current technology: Things work well if you have a solid internet connection with no traffic limits and are plugged into a power outlet. Otherwise, things do not work well at all. This blog post describes the problems that arise and suggests solutions.

Recently, I was shopping for a presenter (a remote control for PowerPoint, Keynote, etc.) and liked the Logitech Presenter R700 (a newer European-only version of the R800) best, due to its design and its integrated display with a countdown. Alas, Macs are not officially supported for this device. Thankfully, they can be made to work together, as explained in this blog post. I also mention how my configuration file can be adapted to an R800.

Web apps have been around for a while, but the ability to install them as if they were native apps is relatively new. This blog post takes a look at what’s currently possible.