JWebAssembly
JWebAssembly is a Java to WebAssembly compiler. It uses Java class files as input. That it can compile any language that compile to Java bytecode. As output it generates the binary format (.wasm file) or the text format (.wat file).
Status of the project
Finished Components
- Java byte code parser
- test framework
- Public API of the Compiler
- Gradle Plugin
Partially Finished
- Binary format file writer (145 of 201 byte code instructions)
- Text format file writer (145 of 201 byte code instructions)
Open Features
- Support for native methods #2
- Exception handling - required the next version of WebAssembly
- Multiple threads - required the next version of WebAssembly
- Memory Management - required the next version of WebAssembly with GC
Status of Required WebAssembly Features
The following table shows the status of future WebAssembly features required by JWebAssembly in nightly builds in various implementations. These features are already used by the trunk version of JWebAssembly.
Feature | V8 | SpiderMonkey | WABT |
---|---|---|---|
floar-to-int | yes | yes | yes |
Sign-extension | yes | yes | yes |
Multi-value | yes | - | yes |
Reference Types | yes | yes | - |
Garbage collection | - | partly | - |
Exceptions | partly | - | partly |
- For V8 it based on the V8 - node.js integrations builds.
- For SpiderMonkey it based on the nightly build of jsshell.
- For WABT it based on libwabt.js via node module wabt@nightly.
To use it also some flags and switches are needed.
Required Java Version
JWebAssembly requires Java SE 8 or higher. It is tested with Java SE 8 on travis-ci.org.
Usage
Exporting functions
To export a Java function to make it accessible from JavaScript you need add the annotation de.inetsoftware.jwebassembly.api.annotation.Export.
import de.inetsoftware.jwebassembly.api.annotation.Export;
@Export
public static int add( int a, int b ) {
return a + b;
}
importing functions
To import a JavaScript function to make it accessible from Java you need add the annotation de.inetsoftware.jwebassembly.api.annotation.Import. The method can be declared native or can have a Java implementation which will be ignored on compiling.
import de.inetsoftware.jwebassembly.api.annotation.Import;
@Import( module = "global.Math", name = "max" )
static int max( int a, int b) {
return Math.max( a, b );
}
Java Limits
In version 1 of WebAssembly you can only compile:
- static methods
- use the data types int, long float and double
Alternatives
For Tool Developer
If you want to develop some tools like plugins for a build system or an IDE, then you need
- to include the full contents of the packages de.inetsoftware.jwebassembly and de.inetsoftware.classparser and its subpackages.
- Create an instance of de.inetsoftware.jwebassembly.JWebAssembly class and use its API.