Do I have to use CoffeeScript?
Rails is going to force you to use coffeescript in an upcoming version and there’s nothing you can do about it.
You have to learn coffeescript now.
It can’t be removed.
You must rewrite all existing apps to use coffeescript if you want to upgrade.
In his usual style, Jason Seifer kindly asks us to quit fighting about CoffeeScript being integrated in Rails 3.1. I was squarely in the anti-CoffeScript camp at first. My argument? It’s just an abstraction on top of a language, and I’d rather just use the language itself. But then Joe Cannatti reminded me that Ruby is merely an abstraction on top of C and C is an abstraction on top of assembler. Thinking about all the goodness Ruby provides has made me excited to try CoffeeScript (I haven’t yet, but will soon).