wasMint

Requirements:

• Emsdk (Emscripten SDK)
• Python
• A web browser (No shit)
• Any source code editor

Story

"I fucking hate emscripten's glue code!" I thought to myself one sunny day at work.

Yeah that's basically it. I'm trying to make my own sort of ... WASM framework/runtime/shebang

Description

wasMint abstracts the classic WASM module object inside an overlaying module object. Each one of the, via emscripten's SDK, exported functions is assigned a "function configuration" which looks something like this

  "_wasMint_8xf32x4_add": {
    "params": [
      "Number",
      "Number",
      "Number",
      "Number",
      "Number",
      "Number",
      "Number",
      "Number"
    ],
    "return": {
      "type": "Float32Array",
      "length": 4
    },
    "showCallback": false
  }

This example defines a native C/WASM/etc function's structure. The function's identifier/name in this case is _wasMint_8xf32x4_add. Its parameters are eight Number types. It returns an array of 32-bit floating point numbers with 4 elements.

Since accessing and correctly interpreting/working with WASM's underlying memory area can be a major source of pain, anxiety and reason for alcohol abuse, wasMint automatically converts WASM's returned pointers and values et cetera to their JavaScript counterparts by utilising this function configuration. As a matter of fact, this format is somewhat inspired by Emscripten's ccall syntax for calling native/WASM functions.

When exporting the main function from the WASM source code, wasMint will automatically assign this function to be the respective module's init function, it can be compared to the Arduino IDE's void setup() function and is only able to be ran once.

Usage

The syntax for constructing a new wasMint Module is as follows:

constructor wasMintModule(wasmPath, functionConfig, globaliseFunctions, growMemoryOnAllocWarning, memory?, debugPrint?);

• wasmPath denotes the URI/URL/Whatever of the WASM file to load, wasMint uses fetch() to load the WASM file.

• functionConfig denotes the aforementioned function config as a JSON object.

• globaliseFunctions denotes if configured wasMint functions should be available on the globalThis Object or exclusively as properties of the containing wasMint module.

• growMemoryOnAllocWarning denotes if wasMint should attempt to grow available memory when an internal malloc(size_t) call would fail due to not having enough available memory.

• memory allows you to supply your own Webassembly.Memory object, if not supplied wasMint will use a memory with 16 initial pages and 32 maximum pages.

• debugPrint(ptr, len) is oftentimes called as an indicator when a configured wasMint function is called. This behaviour can be toggled by setting the showCallback property's value in the functionConfig to false for the respective function.

After the constructor is done ... constructing, you will be able to find your wanted functions on the respective wasMint module's functions property, or, if you have globaliseFunctions enabled, on the globalThis object, without having to call them from the respective wasMint module directly, which is quite nice.

Exposed functions

wasMint exposes several functions that can be useful when working with WebAssembly of any kind, and also in general.

Utility

• __protoClassOf(obj) fairly reliably returns the class name of any class instance, or the classic typeof if it is given a standard object.

• __hashOf(obj) returns a reliable hash of its parameter, regardless of type. I tested it on 1.000.000 uniquely generated 16 character long hexadecimal strings and it produced zero collisions.

Memory alignment

• alignCheck(ptr, align) returns true or false depending on if the ptr is aligned at align byte boundaries.

• alignUp(ptr, align) aligns the ptr upwards to be aligned at align byte boundaries.

Memory read/write

Peeks

• peek(ptr) reads the byte value in the Module's memory at the location specified by ptr.

• peekw(ptr) reads the word value in the Module's memory at the location specified by ptr.

• peekd(ptr) reads the dword value in the Module's memory at the location specified by ptr.

• peekp(ptr) reads the dword pointer value in the Module's memory at the location specified by ptr.

Pokes

• poke(ptr, data) writes the byte value of data to the location specified by ptr in the Module's memory.

• pokew(ptr, data) writes the word value of data to the location specified by ptr in the Module's memory.

• pokd(ptr, data) writes the dword value of data to the location specified by ptr in the Module's memory.

Events

wasMint emits the following events, further details about the event can be found in the event's detail parameters:

• wasMintError Emitted when wasMint encounters an error.

• wasMintInfo Emitted for purely informational and debug output.

• wasMintWASMLoaded Emitted when the WASM file has been loaded.

• wasMintWASMConfigured Emitted when wasMint successfully configured a Module.

Errors

wasMint throws the following errors:

Malloc & Free

• free(ptr) := Cannot free *0! when an attempt to call free(ptr) with ptr := 0 is detected.

• malloc(size) := Cannot allocate 0 bytes! when an attempt to call malloc(size) with size := 0 is detected.

• malloc(size) := Not enough memory! when an attempt to call malloc(size) with a size greater than the maximum available memory is detected.

Function calls

• Invalid parameter count of <count> for <function> when an attempt to call a wasMint configured function with either too little or too many parameters is detected.

• Invalid parameter type of <supplied_type> instead of <expected_type> at <paramater_index> for <function> when an attempt to supply the parameters for a wasMint configured function with a wrong data type.

• Invalid return type configuration of <supplied_type> instead of <expected_type> for <function> when a wasMint configured function returns a type that it was not configured for.

C Counterpart

wasMint comes with a C header file, wasMint.h which contains basic necessary function definitions, implementations, defines, typedefs etc for wasMint to run without nuking itself.

Building

Windows

Execute activate_emcc.bat which executes emsdk's emsdk_env.bat which should be in ..\emsdk Execute build.ps1

Linux systems

Execute build.sh

The function configuration in-depth

Valid configuration datatypes listing:

Data Type	Return Behaviour
String	ptr/val -> JSString
Number	ptr/val -> JSNumber
BigInt	ptr/val -> JSBigInt
Int8Array	ptr/val -> JSInt8Array
Uint8Array	ptr/val -> JSUint8Array
Int16Array	ptr/val -> JSInt16Array
Uint16Array	ptr/val -> JSUint16Array
Uint8ClampedArray	ptr/val -> JSUint8ClampedArray
Int32Array	ptr/val -> JSInt32Array
Uint32Array	ptr/val -> JSUint32Array
Float32Array	ptr/val -> JSFloat32Array
Float64Array	ptr/val -> JSFloat64Array
BigInt64Array	ptr/val -> JSBigInt64Array
BigUint64Array	ptr/val -> JSBigUint64Array
Undefined	ptr/val -> return JSUndefined (Normal return behaviour)
Void	ptr/val -> return; (Returns nothing and must be paired with "length":0)

Figure 1

"_wasMint_print": {
    "params": ["String"],
    "return": {
      "type": "Void",
      "length": 0
    },
    "showCallback": false
  }

This function accepts 1 String as its argument and returns Void. No callback function is going to be executed when this function is called.

Figure 2

  "_wasMint_arrayIOTest": {
    "params": ["Float32Array", "Number"],
    "return": {
      "type": "Float32Array",
      "length": "A1"
    },
    "showCallback": false
  }

This function takes 1 array of 32-bit floating point numbers (Plainly "Number"s in JS) and 1 additional Number argument. All is looking normal so far until we have a look at the "return" object. Obviously we cannot always know the length of a returned Array for sure, and as such wasMint implements argument configurable return lengths. In this case "length": "A1" stands for The length of the returned value shall be the same as Argument1 (A1), so in this case the additional Number argument.

Figure 3

  "_wasMint_arrayXOR": {
    "params": ["Uint32Array", "Number", "Uint32Array", "Number"],
    "return": {
      "type": "Uint32Array",
      "length": "J A1 < A3 ? A1 : A3"
    },
    "showCallback": false
  }

Let's skip over the params and have a direct look at the "return" object again. This time we can see a J followed by the previously mentioned Argument Identifiers forming a ternary expression. Let's go over it: J denotes that the return lenght of this function shall be determined by evaluating a very limited JavsScript expression. AI < A3 ? A1 : A3 denotes that if Argument 1 is less than Argument 3, Argument 1 shall be the return length, otherwise it shall be Argument 3.

As a matter of fact, wasMint implements similar behaviour when the J is replaced by a M, which then denotes that the return length of this function shall be determined by a mathematical expression.

Display

Since...now, wasMint supports "canvas-display" output. By default, a wasMint module automatically looks for an HTML Canvas Element with the id wasMintModuleScreen.

Display Functions

• renderStandby() renders a "Waiting for RGBA Input" text on a yellow-ish background on the display canvas.

• initContext() & initContextFast() initialise the display's 2d context either using Hardware Acceleration or using a (potentially, allegedly, maybe) "faster" software renderer and then render a standby image.

• flatFrame(Uint8ClampedArray) Renders a whole frame based on a linear framebuffer array laid out like [R,G,B,A,R,G,B,A, ...].

• nestedFrame(ArrayOfUint8ClampedArrays) Renders a whole frame based on a nested linear framebuffer array laid out like [[R,G,B,A], [R,G,B,A], ...].

• pixel(x, y, pixel) Renders a single pixel at the coordinates specified by x and y with the RGBA data laid out like [R,G,B,A].