5 ms·

I don't know why people keep talking about WASM, WASM is 1% of what Kubernetes does, it's an alternative to runc nothing more. It's like comparing Docker to Kub

by Thaxll 5y ago

I don't know why people keep talking about WASM, WASM is 1% of what Kubernetes does, it's an alternative to runc nothing more. It's like comparing Docker to Kubernetes.

boomskats 5y ago
I don't think they were comparing WASM to Kubernetes. In the context of the comment you replied to, I read it as WASM potentially obsoleting _containers_ as opposed to _complex orchestration platforms_. > WASM is 1% of what Kubernetes does, it's an alternative to runc nothing more It'd be interesting if you could expand on this. I don't think WASM does _any_ of what Kubernetes does.
- FooBarWidget 5y ago
  Why would WASM obsolete containers?
  - pjmlp 5y ago
    Because new generation startups are on the verge of selling WASM Application Servers....
  - boomskats 5y ago
    Hey, I didn't say I agreed with that statement - I was just pointing out what I thought they were trying to say.
  - ledgerdev 5y ago
    Of course containers will be around probably forever, just as we still have mainframes. Note that current serverless and container platforms start and manage long running instances and occasionally incur cold starts. WASM has near instant startup, making a cold start for each request feasible. I think this could be a key property/advantage that makes it preferable and more economically efficient in the long run. WASM I think has a stronger sandbox as well. Containers in a multi-tenant environment need to run inside a virtual machine. WASM can be run in multi-tenant without the need to isolate each tenant in a virtual machine, again making it more efficient in long run. edit: also recalled a relevant tweet from creator of docker https://twitter.com/solomonstre/status/1111004913222324225 https://twitter.com/solomonstre/status/1111004913222324225
    - FooBarWidget 5y ago
      How can WASM start faster than actually native executables?
      - ledgerdev 5y ago
        containers != native exe. WASM can start faster than containers, not exe.
        FooBarWidget 5y ago
        Wait a minute... we've had virtual machines (in the programming language sense) in like forever. JVM, BEAM, CRL, etc. None of them made containers obsolete. People package Java inside containers even though Java has had non-Linux-container ways to package things in like forever — because people like the tooling surrounding Linux containers. WASM just replaces JVM/BEAM/CLR/etc with its own virtual machine. It doesn't address all the stuff that container orchestration tools address such as lifecycle management, update management, artifact management, autoscaling, networking, management access control, logging & metrics, etc. If you want to start faster than containers, you already can — by not using containers. So given all this above, how is "starts faster than containers" an advantage? And containers are not exactly slow to start. `time docker run -ti --rm ubuntu:20.04 true` => 0.5s. I suppose that's too slow for serverless cold start, but if you really care about that then the startup time of Ruby, Python, Node.js etc with all the packaged dependencies are also in that order.
        ledgerdev 5y ago
        > It doesn't address all the stuff that container orchestration tools address such as lifecycle management, update management, artifact management, autoscaling, networking, management access control, logging & metrics, etc. Absolutely agree, it's just a core technology, which enables new model of operation, on which all that is necessary to run. Right now there is almost nothing. > If you want to start faster than containers, you already can — by not using containers. Only if don't care about security/isolation. WASM is strongly sandboxed. It's appropriate for multi-tenant systems, where containers/jvm/etc have to be run inside of virtual machines(e.g. firecracker) to get acceptable isolation. > I suppose that's too slow for serverless cold start Yep, half a second is way too slow for new instance per request. I think wasm startup time around 35 μs for lucet.
ridruejo 5y ago
Wasm capabilities for server side enable you to have alternatives to K8s like Cloudflare workers that are far superior in performance and much simpler from a developer perspective. They are suitable for niche use cases right now, but I can see a future where they can run more general workloads without the added complexity. That's why people keep talking about Wasm and part of what's exciting about it
- Thaxll 5y ago
  WASM will never be faster because it has a runtime, the only thing that can be quicker is the startup of the application which is less relevant for regular API servers etc ... WASM is interesting client side, service side beside very simple use case like resize my image it's not very good imo
  - smasher164 5y ago
    1. WASM doesn't require a runtime. You can perform AOT compilation on it and still get the benefits of sandboxing. 2. Even under interpretation, WASM doesn't require the interpreter to jump through hoops or optimization to get it to be performant. In this sense, it's more of a portable assembly format than something like LLVM IR.
  - pjmlp 5y ago
    Bytecode as executable format goes back to the early 60's. Plenty of platforms would AOT compile it before execution or at installation time (like IBM/Unisys mainframes and microcomputers).
- pjmlp 5y ago
  EAR files, just saying.
smasher164 5y ago
You're right. By itself, WASM is nothing like K8s. This comparison only makes sense if you consider how you would define the syscall layer. People are seeing WASM in the context of a distributed runtime. Obviously, this would require you to write your applications with something not POSIX-like, but it would allow you to scale your service on a cluster. Your unit of computation isn't just confined to a single machine.

by Thaxll 5y ago

I don't know why people keep talking about WASM, WASM is 1% of what Kubernetes does, it's an alternative to runc nothing more. It's like comparing Docker to Kubernetes.

boomskats 5y ago

I don't think they were comparing WASM to Kubernetes. In the context of the comment you replied to, I read it as WASM potentially obsoleting _containers_ as opposed to _complex orchestration platforms_. > WASM is 1% of what Kubernetes does, it's an alternative to runc nothing more It'd be interesting if you could expand on this. I don't think WASM does _any_ of what Kubernetes does.

FooBarWidget 5y ago
Why would WASM obsolete containers?
- pjmlp 5y ago
  Because new generation startups are on the verge of selling WASM Application Servers....
- boomskats 5y ago
  Hey, I didn't say I agreed with that statement - I was just pointing out what I thought they were trying to say.
- ledgerdev 5y ago
  Of course containers will be around probably forever, just as we still have mainframes. Note that current serverless and container platforms start and manage long running instances and occasionally incur cold starts. WASM has near instant startup, making a cold start for each request feasible. I think this could be a key property/advantage that makes it preferable and more economically efficient in the long run. WASM I think has a stronger sandbox as well. Containers in a multi-tenant environment need to run inside a virtual machine. WASM can be run in multi-tenant without the need to isolate each tenant in a virtual machine, again making it more efficient in long run. edit: also recalled a relevant tweet from creator of docker https://twitter.com/solomonstre/status/1111004913222324225 https://twitter.com/solomonstre/status/1111004913222324225
  - FooBarWidget 5y ago
    How can WASM start faster than actually native executables?
    - ledgerdev 5y ago
      containers != native exe. WASM can start faster than containers, not exe.
      - FooBarWidget 5y ago
        Wait a minute... we've had virtual machines (in the programming language sense) in like forever. JVM, BEAM, CRL, etc. None of them made containers obsolete. People package Java inside containers even though Java has had non-Linux-container ways to package things in like forever — because people like the tooling surrounding Linux containers. WASM just replaces JVM/BEAM/CLR/etc with its own virtual machine. It doesn't address all the stuff that container orchestration tools address such as lifecycle management, update management, artifact management, autoscaling, networking, management access control, logging & metrics, etc. If you want to start faster than containers, you already can — by not using containers. So given all this above, how is "starts faster than containers" an advantage? And containers are not exactly slow to start. `time docker run -ti --rm ubuntu:20.04 true` => 0.5s. I suppose that's too slow for serverless cold start, but if you really care about that then the startup time of Ruby, Python, Node.js etc with all the packaged dependencies are also in that order.
        ledgerdev 5y ago
        > It doesn't address all the stuff that container orchestration tools address such as lifecycle management, update management, artifact management, autoscaling, networking, management access control, logging & metrics, etc. Absolutely agree, it's just a core technology, which enables new model of operation, on which all that is necessary to run. Right now there is almost nothing. > If you want to start faster than containers, you already can — by not using containers. Only if don't care about security/isolation. WASM is strongly sandboxed. It's appropriate for multi-tenant systems, where containers/jvm/etc have to be run inside of virtual machines(e.g. firecracker) to get acceptable isolation. > I suppose that's too slow for serverless cold start Yep, half a second is way too slow for new instance per request. I think wasm startup time around 35 μs for lucet.

ridruejo 5y ago

Wasm capabilities for server side enable you to have alternatives to K8s like Cloudflare workers that are far superior in performance and much simpler from a developer perspective. They are suitable for niche use cases right now, but I can see a future where they can run more general workloads without the added complexity. That's why people keep talking about Wasm and part of what's exciting about it

Thaxll 5y ago
WASM will never be faster because it has a runtime, the only thing that can be quicker is the startup of the application which is less relevant for regular API servers etc ... WASM is interesting client side, service side beside very simple use case like resize my image it's not very good imo
- smasher164 5y ago
  1. WASM doesn't require a runtime. You can perform AOT compilation on it and still get the benefits of sandboxing. 2. Even under interpretation, WASM doesn't require the interpreter to jump through hoops or optimization to get it to be performant. In this sense, it's more of a portable assembly format than something like LLVM IR.
- pjmlp 5y ago
  Bytecode as executable format goes back to the early 60's. Plenty of platforms would AOT compile it before execution or at installation time (like IBM/Unisys mainframes and microcomputers).
pjmlp 5y ago
EAR files, just saying.

smasher164 5y ago

You're right. By itself, WASM is nothing like K8s. This comparison only makes sense if you consider how you would define the syscall layer. People are seeing WASM in the context of a distributed runtime. Obviously, this would require you to write your applications with something not POSIX-like, but it would allow you to scale your service on a cluster. Your unit of computation isn't just confined to a single machine.