ECMAScript 5 Conformance Suite

Jun 30, 2009 10:50 GMT  ·  By

Microsoft has made available a collection of tests designed to streamline the adoption of the next revision of the JavaScript standard. ECMAScript Fifth Edition, as the evolution of JS is referred to, is expected to be completed later in 2009, with formal uptake starting by the end of this year. In order to facilitate a seamless adoption for implementers, Microsoft has released a common specification compliance test suite on CodePlex. In this regard, the ECMAScript 5 Conformance Suite is designed to assess the level at which a specific JavaScript implementation conforms to the ECMAScript, 5th Edition Language Specification.

“At the ECMA TC39 meeting this May, Microsoft announced that it was working on such test suite and made a preliminary version available to the ECMA members. We have now turned development of this test suite into a community development project hosted on Codeplex. This project is released as using the new BSD open source license and will be coordinated by TC39 members including Microsoft,” revealed Allen Wirfs-Brock, Microsoft TC-39 representative.

Microsoft is among the contributors involved in the development of the ECMAScript 5 specification. Wirfs-Brock underlined the importance of browser makers embracing the new standard correctly. But there is also a matter of conserving interoperability among products after the adoption of the next revision of JavaScript. This is where the ECMAScript 5 Conformance Suite comes into play. The suite is set up to help browser makers resolve any incompatibles or interoperability problems.

"Currently the test suite includes about 900 tests that mostly focus [on] features that are new to ECMAScript 5. This is a small fraction of the tests that will be needed to provide complete conformance coverage for the entire language. Microsoft plans on continuing to contribute additional tests to the suite and we are working with other ECMA TC39 members to coordinate with any test suite development they may be doing,” Wirfs-Brock added.

Of course that, this being an open-source project, Microsoft has extended an invitation to all those capable of building ECMAScript conformance tests to take part in the initiative.