Jvm target via Nashorn or Java or Clojure

[jkone27]

would be cool and super duper if F# could target the JVM, which has kind of a big market share still, especially for existing backend services...

• Nashorn seems like JVM could run JS maybe...
• JS 2 CLOJURE or use Clojure as target lang
• JS 2 Java some attempt to compile JS to Java
• calva - clojure vscode extension repo

[MangelMaxime]

The project you linked to seems to be transpilling JS to compile to Java/run over Java.

Because Fable generate JavaScript, you should be able to use the generated code as his.

If the goal is to support Java directly in Fable, then it means adding a new compiler target and for contributors to come to add it and maintain it.

[jkone27]

asking a bit in general if anyone knows, if one wanted to target Java trying to implement a test Fable.Java project, what would be the steps needed?

• clojure target seems not awesome probably because is a lisp/based kind of dynamic lang , maybe targeting java is better for debugging? clojure is dynamic though and is an fp lang so should be easier.. learn clojure in y minutes
• would ANTLR simplify the process?
• could a small subset of F# be the beginning, for example.. just modules and functions for now (converted to static classes in java)

[jkone27]

other interesting facts:

• clojure siding with a springboot project: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/integrating-clojure-java-spring-boot-fernando-nunes-v2kaf/
• https://linktosriram.github.io/clojure-spring-guide/
• groovy (also dynamic language but has better java integration and springboot support)
• https://www.baeldung.com/groovy/spring-using-groovy
• https://www.baeldung.com/spring-boot-groovy-web-app

[jkone27]

an old thread from F# compiler > fsharp/zarchive-fssf-ask-the-board#4 , maybe relevant?

also chatgpt quick Q on the topic:

https://chatgpt.com/share/676430c0-e638-800e-b0ca-9e849516799f

[joprice]

Some other ml-style languages that compile to java might be of interest for research for java/bytecode generation:

• https://github.com/Frege/frege
• https://eta-lang.org/
• http://ocamljava.org/ <- seems to be unmaintained

[jkone27]

add also some libraries that might be useful for Java compilation world > AST / abstract synthax tree etc..

• Eclipse JDT AST
• https://spoon.gforge.inria.fr/ | https://github.com/INRIA/spoon
• https://www.baeldung.com/java-poet (not mantained, has a more recent mantained fork but is in v 0.6
• https://www.antlr.org/ ? seems over complicated :)