In Memory of Deno
The Deno JavaScript runtime is reportedly being acquired by Cloudflare and will be shut down over the next year. Users are expressing disappointment, noting the platform's ease of use and security features compared to alternatives like Node.js.
Why it matters
The shutdown of a major developer tool impacts the workflows of thousands of engineers and highlights the risks of relying on venture-backed open-source projects.
Today we learned that Deno, the user-friendly Javascript runtime & development environment, was acquired by Cloudflare and will be shut down over the coming year.
Deno was my favorite programming experience in over 20 years of software development. Its ease-of-use, security model, portability, and overall philosophy struck a chord with me and some of my close developer friends. Compared to Python, C++, Node.JS, PHP, Java, and other languages I've used, nothing came close.
For example, you could just write deno run somefile.js and it would just work . No painful setup, configuration, or compilation steps.
You could even run scripts from anywhere on the internet: deno run https://example.com/somefile.js . Sounds unsafe? Not quite! Every script runs in a browser-like sandbox that prevents network, file, etc. access unless granted.
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