> typescript compiling to minified javascript

This is an odd example. TypeScript compiles to readable JavaScript for nearly everything except the odd runtime behavior (eg enums) and “downleveling”, which is increasingly unnecessary. Minification is still a separate step AFAIK (if you’re using tsc; obviously ESBuild and SWC are another story, as will be Bun).

You caught me, I've never written typescript. I don't think that changes my claim though

I think I have varying and stronger feelings about it depending on context. Personally if I were to use this or any compile-to-shell thing, I’d probably prefer it produces unreadable output. I don’t want to ever read bash if I can help it. If I have to, it’s a good sign I’m already beyond my preferred scope for using bash in any way.

Whereas if I’m compiling TypeScript/CoffeeScript/anything to JS, it’s pretty likely I already have JS as a built in constraint and I probably want to be able to read the output so I can debug it.