Web Assembly, often abbreviated as Wasm, is an open standard and a binary format designed for safe and efficient execution on web browsers and other environments. It serves as a portable compilation target for high-level programming languages like C, C++, and Rust, enabling them to run in web browsers and other runtime environments with near-native performance.
Here are some key points about Web Assembly:
Portable and Efficient:
Web Assembly is designed to be a low-level virtual machine that runs at near-native speed. It provides a compact binary format that is both efficient to decode and execute.
Browser Integration:
It is supported by most modern web browsers, including Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Microsoft Edge, and Safari. This allows web developers to run code written in languages other than JavaScript directly in the browser.
Programming Language Agnostic:
While often associated with languages like C, C++, and Rust web assembly can be generated from a wide range of programming languages. This versatility makes it a useful tool for web developers who want to leverage existing codebases or write high-performance code for the web.
Safety:
This is designed with security in mind. It enforces a sandboxed execution environment, preventing it from accessing system resources directly. It also provides features like bounds checking to mitigate security vulnerabilities.
Interoperability:
They can interface with JavaScript code seamlessly, allowing developers to leverage the strengths of both languages within a single application. This interoperability is essential for integrating Web Assembly into web applications.
Versatility:
It is not limited to web browsers. It can be used in various runtime environments, such as Node.js, desktop applications, and cloud services, expanding its applicability beyond the web.
Small binary size:
The binaries are compact, reducing load times and improving performance. This is especially important for web applications where fast loading is critical.
Open standard:
It is an open and community-driven standard, maintained by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) and supported by various tech companies and organizations.
To use Web Assembly, developers typically write code in a high-level language like C, C++, or Rust and then compile it to Web Assembly binary format. Once compiled, its code can be embedded in web pages and executed within a web browser or other supported environments.
