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Personal WASM anecdote: I just implemented a WASM based 3d model boolean operation for three.js where I can intersect two models together. The pure js version r

by bjpirt 8y ago

Personal WASM anecdote: I just implemented a WASM based 3d model boolean operation for three.js where I can intersect two models together. The pure js version ran in around 10s on a relatively simple model whereas the WASM version did the same thing in a little under 1s. I've been very impressed by the technology so far! Obviously this kind of CPU intensive work is where it can shine and it's a useful tool to have in your toolkit.

shawn 8y ago
Can you post the code somewhere? I'm very interested in this.
dangerbird2 8y ago
For geometry heavy stuff, web workers (possibly in addition to wasm) be super helpful in preventing the browser from blocking while number crunching.
- valarauca1 8y ago
  wouldn’t shader libraries be better?
  - deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  - jsheard 8y ago
    Ideally yes, but the lack of geometry/tessellation/compute shaders in WebGL limits what you can do on the GPU. Geometry processing that's more complex than moving vertices around has to be done on the CPU for now.
    - gnarbarian 8y ago
      you should check out http://gpu.rocks/ http://gpu.rocks/ pretty awesome GPGPU js library.
    - valarauca1 8y ago
      >Geometry processing that's more complex than moving vertices Have you heard about our lord and savior abstract vector spaces? everything is just moving vertices around in linear transformations.
rasz 8y ago
and whats the performance using native code(c/c++)? Im guessing ~0.1sec on same models.
- RussianCow 8y ago
  From benchmarks I've seen elsewhere, native code is generally roughly 2x faster than WASM, so I doubt that's the case. I'm sure it depends on a lot of factors, though.
  - flohofwoe 8y ago
    Single-threaded, non-SIMD x86-64 code being 1.2x to 2x faster than WASM is what I'm seeing as well. Interestingly I don't see such big differences between browsers as the PSPDFKit benchmark, my suspicion is that this mainly measures overhead when crossing the WASM-JS border.

by bjpirt 8y ago

shawn 8y ago

Can you post the code somewhere? I'm very interested in this.

dangerbird2 8y ago

For geometry heavy stuff, web workers (possibly in addition to wasm) be super helpful in preventing the browser from blocking while number crunching.

valarauca1 8y ago
wouldn’t shader libraries be better?
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- jsheard 8y ago
  Ideally yes, but the lack of geometry/tessellation/compute shaders in WebGL limits what you can do on the GPU. Geometry processing that's more complex than moving vertices around has to be done on the CPU for now.
  - gnarbarian 8y ago
    you should check out http://gpu.rocks/ http://gpu.rocks/ pretty awesome GPGPU js library.
  - valarauca1 8y ago
    >Geometry processing that's more complex than moving vertices Have you heard about our lord and savior abstract vector spaces? everything is just moving vertices around in linear transformations.

rasz 8y ago

and whats the performance using native code(c/c++)? Im guessing ~0.1sec on same models.

RussianCow 8y ago
From benchmarks I've seen elsewhere, native code is generally roughly 2x faster than WASM, so I doubt that's the case. I'm sure it depends on a lot of factors, though.
- flohofwoe 8y ago
  Single-threaded, non-SIMD x86-64 code being 1.2x to 2x faster than WASM is what I'm seeing as well. Interestingly I don't see such big differences between browsers as the PSPDFKit benchmark, my suspicion is that this mainly measures overhead when crossing the WASM-JS border.