[pjmlp]

It is just a binary with first class support without needed to install the world like Emscripten does.

I still don't get why so many take the path of installing npm libraries, Python scripts, Java based closure compiler, LLVM based binaren, instead of just generating a wasm file and JS bindings.

Yes I know Grain depends on binaren, just making the point about the dependencies.

[skohan]

Yeah I think decluttering the dependency tree is one of the best things we can do in terms of advancing web development. We're finally getting to the point where a sensible web stack might be possible with WASM and WebGPU, but you still mostly need this miles-deep toolchain to build anything for it

[hobofan]

> instead of just generating a wasm file and JS bindings

"Just"? I think you are severely underestimating the difficulty of creating and maintaining an additional compiler backend for a programming language.

[pjmlp]

Not at all, to give as example, Emscripten already depends on node and npm anyway, why use Python for scripting instead of JavaScript?

Or Java for minification instead to npm based tooling for the same purpose?

[azakai]

Emscripten used to use Java for Closure Compiler minification, but no longer does since there are (AOT compiled Java) binaries available for it, for all major platforms. It fetches them using npm. So that part of your post is a little out of date.

(As to why use Java at all, Closure is written in it, and its advanced optimizations make a huge difference!)

The use of both node and python in Emscripten is slightly redundant. When Emscripten started, node could not yet replace python for what we do with it. Today, if someone wants to refactor that code to node we'd definitely be interested in such a PR! But overall such a refactoring has been lower in priority compared to other work (new wasm features, performance, etc.).

[pjmlp]

Well, thanks for duplicating my node, python and java installations.

    D:\wasm\emsdk>emsdk install latest
    Installing SDK 'sdk-releases-upstream-e0c15cd14170f407a9eb27fcbad22931dc67feb7-64bit'..
    Installing tool 'node-14.15.5-64bit'..
    Downloading: D:/wasm/emsdk/zips/node-v14.15.5-win-x64.zip from https://storage.googleapis.com/webassembly/emscripten-releases-builds/deps/node-v14.15.5-win-x64.zip, 30284821 Bytes
    Unpacking 'D:/wasm/emsdk/zips/node-v14.15.5-win-x64.zip' to 'D:/wasm/emsdk/node/14.15.5_64bit'
    Done installing tool 'node-14.15.5-64bit'.
    Installing tool 'python-3.9.2-1-64bit'..
    Downloading: D:/wasm/emsdk/zips/python-3.9.2-1-embed-amd64+pywin32.zip from https://storage.googleapis.com/webassembly/emscripten-releases-builds/deps/python-3.9.2-1-embed-amd64+pywin32.zip, 16982397 Bytes
    Unpacking 'D:/wasm/emsdk/zips/python-3.9.2-1-embed-amd64+pywin32.zip' to 'D:/wasm/emsdk/python/3.9.2-1_64bit'
    Done installing tool 'python-3.9.2-1-64bit'.
    Installing tool 'java-8.152-64bit'..
    Downloading: D:/wasm/emsdk/zips/portable_jre_8_update_152_64bit.zip from https://storage.googleapis.com/webassembly/emscripten-releases-builds/deps/portable_jre_8_update_152_64bit.zip, 69241499 Bytes
    Unpacking 'D:/wasm/emsdk/zips/portable_jre_8_update_152_64bit.zip' to 'D:/wasm/emsdk/java/8.152_64bit'
    Done installing tool 'java-8.152-64bit'.
    Installing tool 'releases-upstream-e0c15cd14170f407a9eb27fcbad22931dc67feb7-64bit'..
    Downloading: D:/wasm/emsdk/zips/e0c15cd14170f407a9eb27fcbad22931dc67feb7-wasm-binaries.zip from https://storage.googleapis.com/webassembly/emscripten-releases-builds/win/e0c15cd14170f407a9eb27fcbad22931dc67feb7/wasm-binaries.zip, 433852068 Bytes
    Unpacking 'D:/wasm/emsdk/zips/e0c15cd14170f407a9eb27fcbad22931dc67feb7-wasm-binaries.zip' to 'D:/wasm/emsdk/upstream'
    Done installing tool 'releases-upstream-e0c15cd14170f407a9eb27fcbad22931dc67feb7-64bit'.
    Done installing SDK 'sdk-releases-upstream-e0c15cd14170f407a9eb27fcbad22931dc67feb7-64bit'