Interesting. Does FF 29 on linux perhaps have purely software graphics? It runs much faster than 1 fps on iphones and most androids, 60 fps on modern desktops in safari/chrome, and 30 fps on FF / osx.
Note that it is using canvas 2d rather than canvas 3d (aka WebGL[1]).
But if you take ray casting to extreme, you end up with Ray Tracing[2], which is kinda expensive. Which is why we had such an effusive conversation a few months ago about hardware accelerated RayTracing[3].
Yes, however the raycasting is drawing pixel by pixel. That part is not hardware accelerated, and that is the expensive part. That is that part that shaders speedup a lot, by delegating a lot of the work to the GPU.
That page froze my browser (Firefox 29) and started leaking oodles of memory until I killed it (along with a bunch of other shit I was working on), so I guess I'll count that as a point in favor of software raycasting.