7 ms·

The big news here is coordinated announcements from multiple browsers: https://blogs.windows.com/msedgedev/2016/10/31/webassembly-browser-preview/ https://blog

• kibwen 10y ago
  I've been incredibly impressed at the level of coordination that we've seen from browser vendors on WASM. I know that they've all been working together behind the scenes for decades now on various initiatives, but I can't remember the last time they've all been so publicly supportive of each other as they are here.
  • wlesieutre 10y ago
    WebKit is notably absent from the announcements. It's marked "In Development" though! https://webkit.org/status/#specification-webassembly https://webkit.org/status/#specification-webassembly
    • kibwen 10y ago
      I agree that Webkit is conspicuously absent here, but at least the announcement does mention Apple: "designed by collaborators from Google, Mozilla, Microsoft, Apple, and the W3C WebAssembly Community Group".
      • Ajedi32 10y ago
        The announcement also says: > compatible and stable implementations of WebAssembly behind a flag on trunk in V8 and SpiderMonkey, in development builds of Chakra, and in progress in JavaScriptCore [Emphasis Mine]
    • threeseed 10y ago
      It is coming though. Just running a bit behind I guess: https://bugs.webkit.org/show_bug.cgi?id=159775 https://bugs.webkit.org/show_bug.cgi?id=159775
    • CyberDildonics 10y ago
      If I were apple I would be very worried about web pages eating into my app revenue.
      • astrodust 10y ago
        They make a lot of money off of "apps" that are little more than a WebKit frame with some window dressing. They also make the bulk of their profits selling phones that view web pages, so this is very important to their core business.
        • deleted 10y ago
          [deleted]
      • saurik 10y ago
        Apple's "app revenue" is slightly in the black but really is designed to break even with costs to running the App Store (trivially verifiable from profit reports and other extensive analyses, including comments from Tim Cook on earning calls). Apple makes money on hardware, and to a much much lesser extent on media: apps exist to make their hardware enticing, nothing more. So maybe "if I were Apple I would be very worried about web pages undermining the platform lock in achieved through my leading native app platform", but poking at revenues just repeats a falsehood (which as was pointed out in the article here yesterday is how false information becomes engrained).
        • Jyaif 10y ago
          > is designed to break even with costs to running the App Store They've paid out 50 billion USD to app developers since the beginning of the app stores (1). Since they are taking 30% of the profits, are you saying it has cost them around 21 billion USD to run the appstore? (1) http://www.theverge.com/2016/8/3/12371006/app-store-50-billion-paid-to-developers-apple http://www.theverge.com/2016/8/3/12371006/app-store-50-billi...
          • MBCook 10y ago
    • chc 10y ago
      Apple have always run on their own schedule. They just generally don't do coordination. I wouldn't take it to indicate lack of support.
      • treve 10y ago
        "Apple is always behind" would be a more apt way to describe their dealings with Safari.
        • sswezey 10y ago
          Except WebKit and Safari are the first browser (engines) to be 100% ES6 compatible: http://kangax.github.io/compat-table/es6/ http://kangax.github.io/compat-table/es6/
          • whatever_dude 10y ago
            And yet it's still not 100% ES5 Compatible, like FireFox and Edge, and still behind Chrome (98% to 99%). http://kangax.github.io/compat-table/es5/ http://kangax.github.io/compat-table/es5/ Getting to 100% on ES6 was pleasant, but still a surprise given their track record not just with JS support but with some CSS features too. They're often stragglers, even more so now that Microsoft's browser is getting better.
        • r00fus 10y ago
          Maybe in the past couple of years, but there's a big reason why a lot of mobile browsers were based on WebKit a few years ago.
          • osterbit2 10y ago
            'big reason' being apple made them?
          • ZenoArrow 10y ago
            If you want to build a mobile browser that works on both iOS and Android, WebKit is the only game in town. That's because Apple doesn't allow other web browser engines to be used. If Gecko and Blink (and the upcoming Servo) were given a fairer playing field, perhaps the mobile browser market would be less tied into WebKit.
    • SiVal 10y ago
      It's not WebKit that matters; it's Apple. Apple was also conspicuously absent from the original wasm announcement. Brendan Eich announced (paraphrased), "This wouldn't work without all browser makers buying in, and all of them are today announcing their intention to support wasm, including..." [insert a list of all the companies EXCEPT Apple]. Asked about the missing Apple, he responded that he was sure they were on board but hadn't submitted their written statement by his deadline. I asked why he would assume they were going to publicly commit to it if they hadn't. It would have taken a one-line statement. He got very snippy and said that they were obviously just a bit busy getting ready for one of their regular public performances (maybe WWDC, I don't remember.) Yeah, sure, that must be it. Their show came and went, and I must have missed the announcement. More shows came and went. If Apple ever publicly committed to supporting wasm, as all the other companies did on day one, I haven't seen it, but maybe they eventually did. (It would be easy for me to miss, so I'm seriously asking here.) Is anyone aware of any link to that public announcement of support, the one that we would have seen on day one if Apple hadn't been so busy? If not, then there is another possibility. There are Apple people contributing to the wasm technology, both the development of the spec and the implementation in WebKit (I believe, but correct me if I'm wrong.) That would give Apple the option of supporting wasm if they ever chose to do so. I'm sure they want that option. And no public announcement of support means they are hanging on to their option to exercise their iOS/Safari veto power over this significant advance for open web apps (vs. vendor-controlled native apps).
      • wwweston 10y ago
        I'm going to give Apple one potential benefit-of-the-doubt point here, despite the fact that I think there's also good reason to suspect they're not above succumbing to the incentives they have to hobble the web vs native. If they're primarily about tablet and mobile devices now (lots of indicators that's the case), they're going to be concerned about battery life, performance, and other impacts on user experience. If history repeats itself, they're probably concerned about these things at a level of fussiness that other vendors often don't share. They might well not be on board with wasm for related reasons, or they might take longer to conclude it'll be OK, or work out whatever efforts make them feel good about it. Or they might just lurve their walled garden a lot.
    • SimeVidas 10y ago
      Apple is known to be “shy” when it comes to sharing information with the public.
• sillysaurus3 10y ago
  Clickables: https://blogs.windows.com/msedgedev/2016/10/31/webassembly-browser-preview/ https://blogs.windows.com/msedgedev/2016/10/31/webassembly-b... https://hacks.mozilla.org/2016/10/webassembly-browser-preview https://hacks.mozilla.org/2016/10/webassembly-browser-previe... http://v8project.blogspot.com/2016/10/webassembly-browser-preview.html http://v8project.blogspot.com/2016/10/webassembly-browser-pr...