4 ms·

I'm a Perl fan and as such it saddens me to see other languages targeting wasm. I've been convinced for a while that webassembly is the next big thing in compu

I'm a Perl fan and as such it saddens me to see other languages targeting wasm. I've been convinced for a while that webassembly is the next big thing in computing and so far the Perl community as far as I know has shown close to no interest whatsoever.

mstade 9y ago
Sounds like an opportunity to step up to the plate!
- grondilu 9y ago
  I've tried. It's just hard, frankly. I'm just not that good a coder :(
  - Cyph0n 9y ago
    Ehh I don't think so. I'm certain that you are a good coder. You just need to learn more about the techniques needed to implement a Perl to WASM compiler, and obviously, a ton of time. You can do it man.
    - BenGoldberg 9y ago
      The stuff which makes perl really awesome are the distributions on CPAN. Many (though not all) of these distributions contain XS, which is a type of glue between perl and C. Most of these XS distributions are there to link to some library -- Math::GMP, for example, lets perl code use the GNU gmp multi precision math library. Without some way to make use of distributions with XS parts, then a perl to $other_language_here transpiler is not going to be very interesting.
      - Cyph0n 9y ago
        That makes sense. Library compatibility is a tough issue to deal with. Scala.js faces the same issue when it comes to libraries that depend on the Java stdlib. I believe their goal is to port the entire stdlib, but I'm not sure tbh. It might just be an insurmountable problem.
      - petre 9y ago
        Actually quite few are XS and XS is painful/a terrible way to plug C code inside of the Perl interpreter's guts. For this reason Perl6 aims to rewrite most of the stuff in Perl6/NQP and use NativeCall to call on external libraries.
    - dozzie 9y ago
      I know you're being encouraging, but I think you're underestimating the complexity of Perl parser. From what I remember, there were three subsystems that voted for each expression what programmer meant.
      - Cyph0n 9y ago
        You are right, I'm completely ignorant on the topic haha. Could you clarify what you mean by "vote"?
        tyingq 9y ago
        Perl has some syntax that can be ambiguous. To the point that some code can't be parsed without running it. See this for more on that: http://www.perlmonks.org/?node_id=663393 http://www.perlmonks.org/?node_id=663393
tyingq 9y ago
Wasm has no facility for GC, polymorphic inline cache, or direct DOM integration. They are on the roadmap, but probably far off. So there isn't a direct path to WASM for many dynamically typed languages. Tcl can get by without all that because it's small enough to just port the whole C interpreter instead of trying to have tcl compile down to wasm. That would be very large, slow, and tricky for Perl, Python, etc.
- kodablah 9y ago
  GC is not as far off as you might think. A markdown overview has been merged and there is a PR for impl in the interpreter. See PRs at https://github.com/WebAssembly/gc https://github.com/WebAssembly/gc
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
- vvanders 9y ago
  > Wasm has no facility for GC It shouldn't, GC is a level above Wasm and would complicate languages that don't use it. > or direct DOM integration You mean like this: https://github.com/tcr/rust-webplatform https://github.com/tcr/rust-webplatform ? The problem with most dynamic langauges you listed is they do things that the web doesn't allow or do them in ways that aren't friendly to a browser.
  - tyingq 9y ago
    On GC, maybe you should let them know. They seem to be headed down that path: https://github.com/WebAssembly/design/blob/master/GC.md https://github.com/WebAssembly/design/blob/master/GC.md Oh, and on direct DOM access. You presented a link to an implementation of indirect DOM access. They have an open issue you might find interesting: https://github.com/tcr/rust-webplatform/issues/20 https://github.com/tcr/rust-webplatform/issues/20
- traverseda 9y ago
  Assembly language also doesn't have GC or polymorphic inline cache. I imagine that direct DOM integration would end up just being some kind of shared memory thing. I don't get this kind of complaint. It seems to completely miss the point that webassembly is a compile target, like arm or x86.
petre 9y ago
There would be several options I think. - translate MoarVM bytecode to WASM - add WASM as a Rakudo target - write yet another Perl6 compiler that targets the WASM just as niecza targets the CLR Perl5 will probably end up as a Perl6 slang.

mstade 9y ago

Sounds like an opportunity to step up to the plate!

grondilu 9y ago
I've tried. It's just hard, frankly. I'm just not that good a coder :(
- Cyph0n 9y ago
  Ehh I don't think so. I'm certain that you are a good coder. You just need to learn more about the techniques needed to implement a Perl to WASM compiler, and obviously, a ton of time. You can do it man.
  - BenGoldberg 9y ago
    The stuff which makes perl really awesome are the distributions on CPAN. Many (though not all) of these distributions contain XS, which is a type of glue between perl and C. Most of these XS distributions are there to link to some library -- Math::GMP, for example, lets perl code use the GNU gmp multi precision math library. Without some way to make use of distributions with XS parts, then a perl to $other_language_here transpiler is not going to be very interesting.
    - Cyph0n 9y ago
      That makes sense. Library compatibility is a tough issue to deal with. Scala.js faces the same issue when it comes to libraries that depend on the Java stdlib. I believe their goal is to port the entire stdlib, but I'm not sure tbh. It might just be an insurmountable problem.
    - petre 9y ago
      Actually quite few are XS and XS is painful/a terrible way to plug C code inside of the Perl interpreter's guts. For this reason Perl6 aims to rewrite most of the stuff in Perl6/NQP and use NativeCall to call on external libraries.
  - dozzie 9y ago
    I know you're being encouraging, but I think you're underestimating the complexity of Perl parser. From what I remember, there were three subsystems that voted for each expression what programmer meant.
    - Cyph0n 9y ago
      You are right, I'm completely ignorant on the topic haha. Could you clarify what you mean by "vote"?
      - tyingq 9y ago
        Perl has some syntax that can be ambiguous. To the point that some code can't be parsed without running it. See this for more on that: http://www.perlmonks.org/?node_id=663393 http://www.perlmonks.org/?node_id=663393

tyingq 9y ago

Wasm has no facility for GC, polymorphic inline cache, or direct DOM integration. They are on the roadmap, but probably far off. So there isn't a direct path to WASM for many dynamically typed languages. Tcl can get by without all that because it's small enough to just port the whole C interpreter instead of trying to have tcl compile down to wasm. That would be very large, slow, and tricky for Perl, Python, etc.

kodablah 9y ago
GC is not as far off as you might think. A markdown overview has been merged and there is a PR for impl in the interpreter. See PRs at https://github.com/WebAssembly/gc https://github.com/WebAssembly/gc
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]
vvanders 9y ago
> Wasm has no facility for GC It shouldn't, GC is a level above Wasm and would complicate languages that don't use it. > or direct DOM integration You mean like this: https://github.com/tcr/rust-webplatform https://github.com/tcr/rust-webplatform ? The problem with most dynamic langauges you listed is they do things that the web doesn't allow or do them in ways that aren't friendly to a browser.
- tyingq 9y ago
  On GC, maybe you should let them know. They seem to be headed down that path: https://github.com/WebAssembly/design/blob/master/GC.md https://github.com/WebAssembly/design/blob/master/GC.md Oh, and on direct DOM access. You presented a link to an implementation of indirect DOM access. They have an open issue you might find interesting: https://github.com/tcr/rust-webplatform/issues/20 https://github.com/tcr/rust-webplatform/issues/20
traverseda 9y ago
Assembly language also doesn't have GC or polymorphic inline cache. I imagine that direct DOM integration would end up just being some kind of shared memory thing. I don't get this kind of complaint. It seems to completely miss the point that webassembly is a compile target, like arm or x86.

petre 9y ago

There would be several options I think. - translate MoarVM bytecode to WASM - add WASM as a Rakudo target - write yet another Perl6 compiler that targets the WASM just as niecza targets the CLR Perl5 will probably end up as a Perl6 slang.