4 ms·

A significant point of wasm is runtime-independence. If a runtime implements the right apis, any wasm module that uses them should be able to run (performance a

by nynx 6y ago

A significant point of wasm is runtime-independence. If a runtime implements the right apis, any wasm module that uses them should be able to run (performance aside).

eitland 6y ago
Don't underestimate programmers and especially web developer when it comes to making software dependent on IE or Chrome just because they can't be bothered to do any QA ;-) Full disclosure: I am a developer, and I use and always used Firefox, for both pragmatic and ideological reasons.
- devwastaken 6y ago
  Chrome impliments the necessary features for wasm and webgl. Here's a test: checkaux.github.io Mobile firefox lacks simd, i haven't been able to get its shared memory to work on a local or deployed environment because of bugs in what it thinks is a 'secure context' Desktop and mobile Firefox does not support OffscreenCanvas without turning on flags. It's been years since this was meant to be made. Therefore you cannot use seperate threads to render to webgl without using less performant workarounds. Lack of proper threading means bad page performance. There's lots more dumb bugs and features firefox said it would support and simply never did. Understand there's real reasons as to why chrome is the preferred. it works and it actually puts in the necessary features.
  - kaba0 6y ago
    Then there is no point in having a browser platform, because we are back where we started from. Then why don’t we simply run JVM apps, there are at least a handful of implementations, and it has at least a decent GUI (half joking here). But really, the JVM is where WASM may be several years later.
    - devwastaken 6y ago
      VM's are not all the same, and a VM does not at all guarantee security. The JVM is not designed to run arbitrary code and/or is not as well designed to do it as Javascript or Wasm is. If it were as simple as plug JVM into browser it would be done. However it's not, because the memory and execution safety measures are better in Javascript and Wasm. Wasm should actually have better isolation than JS. If you want to know the details go read the spec and look at the implimentations.
      - kaba0 6y ago
        Java Applets were a security risk, but it was decades ago. Modern JVM has many options to sandbox a running app. But it seems that WASM tries to be a mininal CPU target instead, which is questionable - I can’t wait seeing memory errors (even if only inside a single webpage) on the web. With the good quality GCs available with JS, but even more so on JVM, I would say that running system languages should not be the point.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago
> If a runtime implements the right apis, any wasm module that uses them should be able to run That sounds great right now, when the APIs are relatively small, but will quickly become a nightmare when they grow in complexity. I mean, technically any browser that implements the right stuff can run any web page on earth, yet somehow we still manage to have incompatibilities even when there are only 3 implementations. Or how about POSIX? How much software needs no special casing to run on all POSIX systems? This is the pattern: we abstract things farther with the (mistaken) belief that it will save us from having to deal with messy reality, but as soon as you try to do anything more than simple stuff you find that reality is, in fact, a mess and you have to work around your abstraction to deal with it.
- enos_feedler 6y ago
  Yes, agreed. It will be interesting to follow WASI for this kind of thing. I suspect it will try to rebuild POSIX like use case from the ground up. However, there are going to be so many use cases that fall outside the WASI boundary. Wasm is just getting started.

by nynx 6y ago

A significant point of wasm is runtime-independence. If a runtime implements the right apis, any wasm module that uses them should be able to run (performance aside).

eitland 6y ago

Don't underestimate programmers and especially web developer when it comes to making software dependent on IE or Chrome just because they can't be bothered to do any QA ;-) Full disclosure: I am a developer, and I use and always used Firefox, for both pragmatic and ideological reasons.

devwastaken 6y ago
Chrome impliments the necessary features for wasm and webgl. Here's a test: checkaux.github.io Mobile firefox lacks simd, i haven't been able to get its shared memory to work on a local or deployed environment because of bugs in what it thinks is a 'secure context' Desktop and mobile Firefox does not support OffscreenCanvas without turning on flags. It's been years since this was meant to be made. Therefore you cannot use seperate threads to render to webgl without using less performant workarounds. Lack of proper threading means bad page performance. There's lots more dumb bugs and features firefox said it would support and simply never did. Understand there's real reasons as to why chrome is the preferred. it works and it actually puts in the necessary features.
- kaba0 6y ago
  Then there is no point in having a browser platform, because we are back where we started from. Then why don’t we simply run JVM apps, there are at least a handful of implementations, and it has at least a decent GUI (half joking here). But really, the JVM is where WASM may be several years later.
  - devwastaken 6y ago
    VM's are not all the same, and a VM does not at all guarantee security. The JVM is not designed to run arbitrary code and/or is not as well designed to do it as Javascript or Wasm is. If it were as simple as plug JVM into browser it would be done. However it's not, because the memory and execution safety measures are better in Javascript and Wasm. Wasm should actually have better isolation than JS. If you want to know the details go read the spec and look at the implimentations.
    - kaba0 6y ago
      Java Applets were a security risk, but it was decades ago. Modern JVM has many options to sandbox a running app. But it seems that WASM tries to be a mininal CPU target instead, which is questionable - I can’t wait seeing memory errors (even if only inside a single webpage) on the web. With the good quality GCs available with JS, but even more so on JVM, I would say that running system languages should not be the point.

AnIdiotOnTheNet 6y ago

> If a runtime implements the right apis, any wasm module that uses them should be able to run That sounds great right now, when the APIs are relatively small, but will quickly become a nightmare when they grow in complexity. I mean, technically any browser that implements the right stuff can run any web page on earth, yet somehow we still manage to have incompatibilities even when there are only 3 implementations. Or how about POSIX? How much software needs no special casing to run on all POSIX systems? This is the pattern: we abstract things farther with the (mistaken) belief that it will save us from having to deal with messy reality, but as soon as you try to do anything more than simple stuff you find that reality is, in fact, a mess and you have to work around your abstraction to deal with it.

enos_feedler 6y ago
Yes, agreed. It will be interesting to follow WASI for this kind of thing. I suspect it will try to rebuild POSIX like use case from the ground up. However, there are going to be so many use cases that fall outside the WASI boundary. Wasm is just getting started.