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V8 is fixing bugs they had that caused asm.js-style JavaScript to be slower than it needs to be. I doubt they'll honour the "use asm" directive in the near futu

by lucian1900 13y ago

V8 is fixing bugs they had that caused asm.js-style JavaScript to be slower than it needs to be. I doubt they'll honour the "use asm" directive in the near future. asm.js is indeed a smaller API. I guess extreme pragmatism is what has been driving the web, but it can be argued whether that's great or terrible :(

mwcampbell 13y ago
Shortest-path evolution has the best chance of winning, and asm.js is the shortest path for everyone except Google.
- cromwellian 13y ago
  Winning what? If 500+ million NaCl enabled Chrome users couldn't set off a revolution in web gaming, why would asm.js? Reality is, gamers don't really care about what the implementation details are, and whether someone is distributed as web, or as installable download, or via Optical Disc. They want the best game that maximizes the bang for their buck. None of the proposed web solutions do that, although NaCL promises access to more system resources than asm.js does.
  - kevingadd 13y ago
    Well, for one thing, NaCl was a stunning failure because it required platform-specific compiles. For another thing, it only worked on the Chrome Web Store, and nobody gives a shit about the Chrome Web Store. It also didn't work on Android... But yeah, I'm sure it's just because all code-in-the-browser technologies are doomed and asm.js is too, not because Google's execution was completely incompetent.
    - iso8859-1 13y ago
      "was"? What about the linked Google announcement? I'm pretty sure PNaCl will work on Android, I think that's why they made it. Why are all code-in-the-browser technologies doomed? I'd really like an explanation, especially since you have a stake in the game (JSIL).
      - chinpokomon 13y ago
        I'm pretty sure PNaCl was created to solve the disconnect between ARM based Chromebooks and Atom based Chromebooks. If it also works for Chrome on Android, I think that is a happy side effect, especially since PNaCl was introduced (through flags) in Chrome shortly after the Samsung ARM Chromebook was released. If you want to create packaged Chrome applications for the Chrome Store, you want them to work regardless of the machine architecture.
        dragonwriter 13y ago
        > I'm pretty sure PNaCl was created to solve the disconnect between ARM based Chromebooks and Atom based Chromebooks. I think PNaCl was announced (as a long-range project) before ChromeOS was, and I'm certain it was announced before there were any actual Chromebooks, muhc less a concrete disconnect between ARM-based and x86-based Chromebooks. It was created to solve the problem of high-performance software being tied to a particular native platform, which was clearly an issue for Google's long-term vision of web-as-dominant-platform long before there were concrete issues of different platforms for Chromebooks.
    - dragonwriter 13y ago
      > For another thing, it only worked on the Chrome Web Store Actually, it works outside of the Web Store, but turning it on outside of the CWS is behind a defaults-to-off flag in the Chrome's settings, because Google didn't want NaCl code getting deployed widely on the web, because they didn't want code that would be locked to one architecture being widely deployed when they knew the plan was for PNaCl to be the long-term replacement.
      - kevingadd 13y ago
        I'm not going to criticize their thought process behind locking NaCl to CWS; from a standards and 'open web' perspective, that was a sound choice. That doesn't change the fact that it largely contributed to its failure in the market. The game devs I talk to on a regular basis wanted to use NaCl, but couldn't, because it was tied to the CWS.
        dragonwriter 13y ago
        > That doesn't change the fact that it largely contributed to its failure in the market. Yes, the fact that Google choose to limit it specifically to prevent it from being widespread in the market contributed to its limited use in the market. But then, since its purpose wasn't to be widely used in the market (hence the restrictions imposed) but to validate technology and components for PNaCl, that's not really that surprising.
azakai 13y ago
> V8 is fixing bugs they had that caused asm.js-style JavaScript to be slower than it needs to be. I doubt they'll honour the "use asm" directive in the near future. They don't need to use the "use asm" directive. There are many ways to optimize the asm.js style of code. The important part is that it is not something that needs standardizing. It is a subset of JavaScript, nothing more. The output of other compilers like GWT is also a particular subset of JavaScript, and for years now browsers have optimized in varying degrees for many such subsets.

mwcampbell 13y ago

Shortest-path evolution has the best chance of winning, and asm.js is the shortest path for everyone except Google.

cromwellian 13y ago
Winning what? If 500+ million NaCl enabled Chrome users couldn't set off a revolution in web gaming, why would asm.js? Reality is, gamers don't really care about what the implementation details are, and whether someone is distributed as web, or as installable download, or via Optical Disc. They want the best game that maximizes the bang for their buck. None of the proposed web solutions do that, although NaCL promises access to more system resources than asm.js does.
- kevingadd 13y ago
  Well, for one thing, NaCl was a stunning failure because it required platform-specific compiles. For another thing, it only worked on the Chrome Web Store, and nobody gives a shit about the Chrome Web Store. It also didn't work on Android... But yeah, I'm sure it's just because all code-in-the-browser technologies are doomed and asm.js is too, not because Google's execution was completely incompetent.
  - iso8859-1 13y ago
    "was"? What about the linked Google announcement? I'm pretty sure PNaCl will work on Android, I think that's why they made it. Why are all code-in-the-browser technologies doomed? I'd really like an explanation, especially since you have a stake in the game (JSIL).
    - chinpokomon 13y ago
      I'm pretty sure PNaCl was created to solve the disconnect between ARM based Chromebooks and Atom based Chromebooks. If it also works for Chrome on Android, I think that is a happy side effect, especially since PNaCl was introduced (through flags) in Chrome shortly after the Samsung ARM Chromebook was released. If you want to create packaged Chrome applications for the Chrome Store, you want them to work regardless of the machine architecture.
      - dragonwriter 13y ago
        > I'm pretty sure PNaCl was created to solve the disconnect between ARM based Chromebooks and Atom based Chromebooks. I think PNaCl was announced (as a long-range project) before ChromeOS was, and I'm certain it was announced before there were any actual Chromebooks, muhc less a concrete disconnect between ARM-based and x86-based Chromebooks. It was created to solve the problem of high-performance software being tied to a particular native platform, which was clearly an issue for Google's long-term vision of web-as-dominant-platform long before there were concrete issues of different platforms for Chromebooks.
  - dragonwriter 13y ago
    > For another thing, it only worked on the Chrome Web Store Actually, it works outside of the Web Store, but turning it on outside of the CWS is behind a defaults-to-off flag in the Chrome's settings, because Google didn't want NaCl code getting deployed widely on the web, because they didn't want code that would be locked to one architecture being widely deployed when they knew the plan was for PNaCl to be the long-term replacement.
    - kevingadd 13y ago
      I'm not going to criticize their thought process behind locking NaCl to CWS; from a standards and 'open web' perspective, that was a sound choice. That doesn't change the fact that it largely contributed to its failure in the market. The game devs I talk to on a regular basis wanted to use NaCl, but couldn't, because it was tied to the CWS.
      - dragonwriter 13y ago
        > That doesn't change the fact that it largely contributed to its failure in the market. Yes, the fact that Google choose to limit it specifically to prevent it from being widespread in the market contributed to its limited use in the market. But then, since its purpose wasn't to be widely used in the market (hence the restrictions imposed) but to validate technology and components for PNaCl, that's not really that surprising.

azakai 13y ago

> V8 is fixing bugs they had that caused asm.js-style JavaScript to be slower than it needs to be. I doubt they'll honour the "use asm" directive in the near future. They don't need to use the "use asm" directive. There are many ways to optimize the asm.js style of code. The important part is that it is not something that needs standardizing. It is a subset of JavaScript, nothing more. The output of other compilers like GWT is also a particular subset of JavaScript, and for years now browsers have optimized in varying degrees for many such subsets.