Show HN: Python to C++14 transpiler (opens in new tab)

I think it implies a translation from one high level language to another (not that 'high level' is well defined either), with only desugaring and maybe type-checking - no real lowering or optimisations. That's a useful subset of compilers, so can have its own word I believe.

It's just short-hand for source-to-source compiler and IMHO has been used enough to warrant its inclusion in a programmer's dictionary.

Indeed and most compilers do exactly that. Cant help getting a little annoyed whenever I hear this 'transpiler' word. I guess the ship has sailed, oh well !

I think it makes sense to use a different term for this "compiler"-esque behavior. For example, I might edit the output of CoffeeScript generated Javascript whereas I wouldn't know how to modify the output of gcc.

You can certainly think this distinction doesn't merit using a different word, but you shouldn't think that people who use the word "transpile" use it as a synonym for "compiler".

But it fits the project since I don't have any background or experience in compiler design.

But a compiler has come to mean a program that translates source-code into machine code.

By this new understanding, a transpiler is a combination of a compiler and a decompiler with different input and output languages.

So po-tay-toes, po-taa-toes. No one cares, we know what is meant by transpiler.

Point taken that it is still a compiler.

So view through that lens I'm not really seeing the novelty right now?

[0]: http://github.com/serge-sans-paille/pythran/

For the array I do a little hackery. You can define the array without an initial value in the container and I can guess the value type.

  arr = []
  arr.append(1)

  std::vector<decltype(1)> arr{};
  arr.push_back(1);

    auto var = // this type can't be inferred because it's not used
    {
      auto var = 2;
    }

If you pass a type that cannot be used with the <= operator it will error in compile time.

Being able to do this is part of why C++ templates are much more powerful than Java/C# generics and why they enable a different (and alternative) form of polymorphism to inheritance and explicit interfaces.