Uploading code is directly execute, so better do something like this:

function foo(){ 
  setTimeout( function(){ console.log("after");},0);
  console.log("before");
}

setTimeout(foo,1E3);

Ye, figured that out. I wrote some code to wrap the right hand side of ide in a function block, like you've just written.
Not sure if you want that to be a permanent feature of the ide or not. I would recommend its much kinder to be people who are working within the ide because they have less real-world testing (uploading to device) to perform. And its laboursome to always wrap your code in function block manually.

But its up to you guys. You'll know best. xx

I fail to see how this is "very useful" and why to always modify code that someone uploads just because of 'setTimeout with zero parameter' case in combination with 'user thinks it is "laboursome to always wrap your code in function block manually"' case.

And BTW wrapping into function block like this would break variables, uploading

var x=5;

is not same as

(function(){

var x=5;

})();

second case have x undefined after upload

Thanks for the suggestion - but in this case it's not something I'd want to pull in.

Answered on the forum post as well, but for others that find this:

Espruino is designed for devices with limited RAM. As such, by allowing it to execute code as it is uploaded it is able to fit in twice as much code (it's not having to store the text version of what it is running, as well as the 'interpreted' version).

This change effectively not only negates the efficiency but makes it 50% worse: you now have to store the text version, interpreted giant function, as well as the result of executing that function.

http://www.espruino.com/Saving has some more info about ways of saving as well.