Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-03-07 Thread Ola Fosheim Grøstad via Digitalmars-d
This looks like a nice tool for those wanting to learn more about 
WebAssembly:


https://mbebenita.github.io/WasmExplorer/



Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-03-03 Thread H. S. Teoh via Digitalmars-d
On Fri, Mar 03, 2017 at 08:06:00AM +, Ola Fosheim Grøstad via Digitalmars-d 
wrote:
[...]
> The general public has become more ignorant. I guess to a large extent
> because of information overflow and the downfall of real journalism
> (e.g.  the old payment model is failing which means media is
> converging on click-bait-ad-sales). A news story has to run for
> several weeks now for anyone to take notice, otherwise it will just
> drown in all the irrelevant noise (celebrity news and what not).
[...]

Ahahaha... "celebrity news"... an oxymoron, if there ever was one.


T

-- 
Programming is not just an act of telling a computer what to do: it is
also an act of telling other programmers what you wished the computer to
do. Both are important, and the latter deserves care. -- Andrew Morton


Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-03-03 Thread Ola Fosheim Grøstad via Digitalmars-d
On Thursday, 2 March 2017 at 19:52:58 UTC, Nick Sabalausky 
(Abscissa) wrote:
At some point there will be a resistance movement, forking one 
of the

main browsers and building in collaborative blacklisting etc.


I hope, but I'm skeptical. Big business is definitely headed 
very 1984, but that's happening less because of Orwellian 
control, and more because of mass apathy and widespread 
short-sighted self-interest (more Huxley than Orwell, from what 
I gather).


The general public has become more ignorant. I guess to a large 
extent because of information overflow and the downfall of real 
journalism (e.g. the old payment model is failing which means 
media is converging on click-bait-ad-sales). A news story has to 
run for several weeks now for anyone to take notice, otherwise it 
will just drown in all the irrelevant noise (celebrity news and 
what not).


I also see certain issues with collaborative rankings - they 
can only be as intelligent as the average user, which often 
doesn't seem to be very much. And then there's other 
difficulties like this: https://xkcd.com/937/


I think it would be more like organizations like Amnesty 
International and consumer rights organizations having the 
ability to annotate websites and webpages with vetted information 
about the content.


Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-03-02 Thread Nick Sabalausky (Abscissa) via Digitalmars-d

On 03/02/2017 04:18 AM, Ola Fosheim Grøstad wrote:

On Wednesday, 1 March 2017 at 18:28:00 UTC, Nick Sabalausky (Abscissa)
wrote:

Well, it's Google's main domain, and they've kinda already settled
into a pattern of making decisions more on self-serving grounds than
for the good of the product/users. "Don't be evil" doesn't exactly set
a very high bar.


I don't know, I have more trouble with Safari and Edge than Chrome and
Firefox.


Well, web devs cater to Chrome and FF, and tend to ignore Safari/Edge. 
And I wasn't really just talking about browsers with that.



The Internet is getting very 1984ish, but this goes way beyond Google,
which I find to be better than average. Have you noticed how you receive
advertising all over the Internet for the same product you looked at a
few days before in a webshop and how Facebook and Linked In lists
suggestions based on people you have only had peripheral interaction
with? Extremely annoying. It makes me rank those companies as shady.


Maybe it's ADD-related or something, but my brain literally isn't 
capable of reading a page of text if there's something animating on the 
page (usually ads). Even the blinking cursor in a code editor can break 
my focus. So I've had to install Adblock Edge and NoScript[1] just to be 
*able* to use the web at all (basic, honest-to-goodness accessibility).


So, no, I honestly haven't noticed that phenomenon (although I have 
heard about it once before).


[1] Back when I was using Windows more, that Adblock Edge/NoScript combo 
also had the additional benefit of keeping my machine much safer from 
drive-by malware, even when other people around me were far more careful 
about good antivirus, never turned off auto-updates, and were still 
having their machines taken over by ransomware - which never touched any 
of my machines.



At some point there will be a resistance movement, forking one of the
main browsers and building in collaborative blacklisting etc.


I hope, but I'm skeptical. Big business is definitely headed very 1984, 
but that's happening less because of Orwellian control, and more because 
of mass apathy and widespread short-sighted self-interest (more Huxley 
than Orwell, from what I gather).


I also see certain issues with collaborative rankings - they can only be 
as intelligent as the average user, which often doesn't seem to be very 
much. And then there's other difficulties like this: https://xkcd.com/937/




Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-03-02 Thread Ola Fosheim Grøstad via Digitalmars-d
On Wednesday, 1 March 2017 at 18:28:00 UTC, Nick Sabalausky 
(Abscissa) wrote:
Well, it's Google's main domain, and they've kinda already 
settled into a pattern of making decisions more on self-serving 
grounds than for the good of the product/users. "Don't be evil" 
doesn't exactly set a very high bar.


I don't know, I have more trouble with Safari and Edge than 
Chrome and Firefox.


Google's main domain is advertising, same with Facebook. Software 
is just a way to keep competition away and collecting information 
about users.


The Internet is getting very 1984ish, but this goes way beyond 
Google, which I find to be better than average. Have you noticed 
how you receive advertising all over the Internet for the same 
product you looked at a few days before in a webshop and how 
Facebook and Linked In lists suggestions based on people you have 
only had peripheral interaction with? Extremely annoying. It 
makes me rank those companies as shady.


At some point there will be a resistance movement, forking one of 
the main browsers and building in collaborative blacklisting etc. 
Unfortunately, non-tech people are quite oblivious to what is 
going on. Maybe the new collaborative website annotation 
standards will turn into something. Firefox could take a lead 
there.




Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-03-01 Thread Nick Sabalausky (Abscissa) via Digitalmars-d

On 03/01/2017 05:15 AM, Ola Fosheim Grøstad wrote:


So, maybe the conclusion is: don't let corporations create technology
standards in their main domain, because then they try to create
monopolies and start misbehaving. Browsers is  a side-line tech, so...
this might have a chance..?



Well, it's Google's main domain, and they've kinda already settled into 
a pattern of making decisions more on self-serving grounds than for the 
good of the product/users. "Don't be evil" doesn't exactly set a very 
high bar.


Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-03-01 Thread Ola Fosheim Grøstad via Digitalmars-d
On Wednesday, 1 March 2017 at 09:00:42 UTC, Nick Sabalausky 
(Abscissa) wrote:
If we could invent a technical way to screw over, underminine, 
and completely replace corporate interests, it would be the 
single greatest achievement in computing (not to mention 
economic theory), EVER.


I bet Intel would have undermined WebAssembly if they were given 
a chance. Now other CPU vendors (e.g. mobile) can strengthen 
their position by making WebAssembly applications a target for 
testing.


So, maybe the conclusion is: don't let corporations create 
technology standards in their main domain, because then they try 
to create monopolies and start misbehaving. Browsers is  a 
side-line tech, so... this might have a chance..?




Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-03-01 Thread Ola Fosheim Grøstad via Digitalmars-d
On Wednesday, 1 March 2017 at 08:56:37 UTC, Nick Sabalausky 
(Abscissa) wrote:

On 03/01/2017 03:47 AM, Ola Fosheim Grøstad wrote:

On Wednesday, 1 March 2017 at 08:01:41 UTC, Saurabh Das wrote:
I'm not so up-to-date about the mechanics of WebAssembly, but 
it would

be pretty exciting to run D code in the browser.

Is this now possible or have I completely misunderstood what
WebAssembly allows for?


It should be possible, at least if you give up on the garbage 
collector.




Huh? Isn't webasm GC'ed? Ir is it like a D-vs-wasm CG 
incompatibility?


Nope, no GC. It is a "minimum viable product", so also no 
threading or SIMD. This is a good strategy, make sure that all 
implementations are fully compliant and collect experience before 
adding more features into the mix.


http://webassembly.org/docs/gc/

I believe both Rust  and C++ compilers will target WebAssembly. 
In the beginning I suspect the best approach is to the core 
application in a set of WebAssembly modules and tie it together 
with the UI in JavaScript/TypeScript/JSX/Angular2 etc




Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-03-01 Thread Nick Sabalausky (Abscissa) via Digitalmars-d

On 03/01/2017 03:46 AM, Ola Fosheim Grøstad wrote:

On Tuesday, 28 February 2017 at 21:50:11 UTC, Jack Stouffer wrote:

What a long, roundabout path we've taken to end up back where we
started: shipping binaries in a sandboxed environment.


Portable object-files is something that that people have tried to
achieve since the 1980s, but vendors have always undermined it. If this
goes through then it will be the first time we have a portable object
files with backing of the major vendors. Even Microsoft.



If we could invent a technical way to screw over, underminine, and 
completely replace corporate interests, it would be the single greatest 
achievement in computing (not to mention economic theory), EVER.


Believe it it not, I'm still holding my breath for that, impossible 
though it may be. Call me a dreamer. Or a nutjob ;) Same thing, I suspect ;)




Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-03-01 Thread Nick Sabalausky (Abscissa) via Digitalmars-d

On 03/01/2017 03:47 AM, Ola Fosheim Grøstad wrote:

On Wednesday, 1 March 2017 at 08:01:41 UTC, Saurabh Das wrote:

I'm not so up-to-date about the mechanics of WebAssembly, but it would
be pretty exciting to run D code in the browser.

Is this now possible or have I completely misunderstood what
WebAssembly allows for?


It should be possible, at least if you give up on the garbage collector.



Huh? Isn't webasm GC'ed? Ir is it like a D-vs-wasm CG incompatibility?


Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-03-01 Thread Ola Fosheim Grøstad via Digitalmars-d

On Wednesday, 1 March 2017 at 08:01:41 UTC, Saurabh Das wrote:
I'm not so up-to-date about the mechanics of WebAssembly, but 
it would be pretty exciting to run D code in the browser.


Is this now possible or have I completely misunderstood what 
WebAssembly allows for?


It should be possible, at least if you give up on the garbage 
collector.




Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-03-01 Thread Ola Fosheim Grøstad via Digitalmars-d

On Tuesday, 28 February 2017 at 21:50:11 UTC, Jack Stouffer wrote:
What a long, roundabout path we've taken to end up back where 
we started: shipping binaries in a sandboxed environment.


Portable object-files is something that that people have tried to 
achieve since the 1980s, but vendors have always undermined it. 
If this goes through then it will be the first time we have a 
portable object files with backing of the major vendors. Even 
Microsoft.


The Java VM essentially ended up as a single vendor solution and 
didn't live up to it's hype in the browser.




Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-03-01 Thread Saurabh Das via Digitalmars-d
I'm not so up-to-date about the mechanics of WebAssembly, but it 
would be pretty exciting to run D code in the browser.


Is this now possible or have I completely misunderstood what 
WebAssembly allows for?




Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-02-28 Thread Nick Sabalausky (Abscissa) via Digitalmars-d

On 02/28/2017 11:26 PM, Nick Sabalausky (Abscissa) wrote:

On 02/28/2017 10:28 PM, Joakim wrote:

What is the alternative you prefer: javascript and its myriad
vulnerabilities?


Probably shipping binaries in a sandboxed environment...but, you know,
*without* the browser community badly reinventing the entire software
stack.


For that matter, wasn't one of the two key points to webapps in the 
first place the promise of thwarting vulnerabilities by using the 
browser as a sandbox? Oh! Why yes, it was!




Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-02-28 Thread Nick Sabalausky (Abscissa) via Digitalmars-d

On 02/28/2017 10:28 PM, Joakim wrote:

On Tuesday, 28 February 2017 at 21:50:11 UTC, Jack Stouffer wrote:

On Tuesday, 28 February 2017 at 18:04:39 UTC, Ola Fosheim Grøstad wrote:

[...]


What a long, roundabout path we've taken to end up back where we
started: shipping binaries in a sandboxed environment.


My new favorite quote :)



What is the alternative you prefer: javascript and its myriad
vulnerabilities?


Probably shipping binaries in a sandboxed environment...but, you know, 
*without* the browser community badly reinventing the entire software stack.


Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-02-28 Thread Joakim via Digitalmars-d

On Tuesday, 28 February 2017 at 21:50:11 UTC, Jack Stouffer wrote:
On Tuesday, 28 February 2017 at 18:04:39 UTC, Ola Fosheim 
Grøstad wrote:

[...]


What a long, roundabout path we've taken to end up back where 
we started: shipping binaries in a sandboxed environment.


What is the alternative you prefer: javascript and its myriad 
vulnerabilities?


Re: WebAssembly design is done?

2017-02-28 Thread Jack Stouffer via Digitalmars-d
On Tuesday, 28 February 2017 at 18:04:39 UTC, Ola Fosheim Grøstad 
wrote:
«WebAssembly CG members representing four browsers, Chrome, 
Edge, Firefox,
and WebKit, have reached consensus that the design of the 
initial (MVP [1])
WebAssembly API and binary format is complete to the extent 
that no further
design work is possible without implementation experience and 
significant
usage. This marks the end of the Browser Preview and signals 
that browsers
can begin shipping WebAssembly on-by-default. From this point 
forward,
future features will be designed to ensure backwards 
compatibility.»


https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-webassembly/2017Feb/0002.html

Cool.


What a long, roundabout path we've taken to end up back where we 
started: shipping binaries in a sandboxed environment.