4 ms·
Something like this was tried before. The year was ~1995 and the trough of disillusionment for Java applets was far in the future. WordPerfect decided that th
by mgerdts 5y ago
Something like this was tried before. The year was ~1995 and the trough of disillusionment for Java applets was far in the future. WordPerfect decided that the future was the web and they wanted in. They ported WordPerfect to Java and and published an applet. The applet was huge (at least 10's of MB), particularly so when fast internet access for most meant a 28.8k modem.
After the excruciating wait for it to load, it crashed. I would have been happier if it would have at least flashed a message "don't forget to drink your Ovaltine."
A quarter of a century later, this attempt works much better.
- gigel82 5y agoNot really the same. WASM is part of the browser and an open web standard. It can be emulated entirely in JavaScript which comes with serious security guarantees. Java applets are in the same category as ActiveX controls, which is basically hosting native code (with all the security issues that entails) in a DOM element.