Translating the Future: Transpilers and the New Temporalities of Programming in JavaScript
Abstract
This essay is about transpilation and the future of translation work done by machines. “Transpilation” is a particularly ugly portmanteau word that refers, in web development, to a particularly confusing new concept used in building online JavaScript application. Mashing together “translation” with “compilation,” it refers to the process of translating one human-readable computer programming language into another. While compilation without translation refers to the conversion of human-readable programming languages into the digital codes understandable by computers, the end product of transpilation is another human-readable language.
Description
This essay was originally published in the web journal, _Amodern_. The journal's site recently vanished, so I offer an archived copy here.Subject
transpilationrhetoric
computational rhetoric
software studies
javascript
history of computing
infrastructure studies
digital humanities