Option to emit file with named constants

[zspitz]

Currently,

• Javascript doesn't have any mechanism to access static members, only creatable objects (new ActiveXObject(...))
  • modules -- collection of named constants
  • enums -- two aspects:
    1. named constants
    2. limited set of values
• Typescript's const enum can be used to model ActiveX enums, because they can be defined in an ambient context and the values are inlined into the calling code
  • but only for ActiveX enums; ActiveX modules do not constrain to a limited set of values, only assign names to them
• const enum is limited to numbers. This means:
  • no string-based enums, or enums of any other type

---

Non-numeric enums should be emitted as type declarations, which will allow for compile-time limitation to those values.

type CommandID = 
    "{04E725B0-ACAE-11D2-A093-00C04F72DC3C}" |
    "{E208C170-ACAD-11D2-A093-00C04F72DC3C}" ...

---

COM modules should be emitted as an additional file with runtime-assigned constants.

namespace CommandID { 
  const wiaCommandChangeDocument = "{04E725B0-ACAE-11D2-A093-00C04F72DC3C}";
  const wiaCommandDeleteAllItems = "{E208C170-ACAD-11D2-A093-00C04F72DC3C}";
  const wiaCommandSynchronize = "{9B26B7B2-ACAD-11D2-A093-00C04F72DC3C}";
  const wiaCommandTakePicture = "{AF933CAC-ACAD-11D2-A093-00C04F72DC3C}";
  const wiaCommandUnloadDocument = "{1F3B3D8E-ACAE-11D2-A093-00C04F72DC3C}";
}

See also here

[zspitz]

With the introduction of microsoft/TypeScript#15486, it is now possible to output const enums with string values in definition files, as well as mixed string/numeric enums.

[zspitz]

Fixed with f97a380. Modules and all enums (numeric/non-numeric) are outputted as const enum.