With our push to share the kernel of your software in reusable C# libraries and build a native experience per platform (iOS, Android, WP7 on phones and WPF/Windows, MonoMac/OSX, Gtk/Linux) one component that is always missing is what about doing a web UI that also shares some of the code.
Until very recently the answer was far from optimal, and included things like: put the kernel on the server and use some .NET stack to ship the HTML to the client.
Today there are two solid choices to run your C# code on the browser and share code between the web and your native UIs.
JSIL will translate the ECMA/.NET Intermediate Language into Javascript and will run your code in the browser. JSIL is pretty sophisticated and their approach at running IL code on the browser also includes a bridge that allows your .NET code to reference web page elements. This means that you can access the DOM directly from C#.
You can try their Try JSIL page to get a taste of what is possible.
The Saltarelle Compiler takes a different approach. It is a C# 4.0 compiler that generates JavaScript instead of generating IL. It is interesting that this compiler is built on top of the new NRefactory which is in turn built on top of our C# Compiler as a Service.
It is a fresh, new compiler and unlik JSIL it is limited to compiling the C# language. Although it is missing some language features, it is actively being developed.
This compiler was inspired by Script# which is a C#-look-alike language that generated Javascript for consuming on the browser.
I left NativeClient out, which is not fair, considering that both Bastion and Go Home Dinosaurs are both powered by Mono running on Native Client.
The only downside with Native Client today is that it does not run on iOS or Android.
Posted on 06 Sep 2012