wapm-cli VS v86

To actually compile this we can use a tool called WABT (WebAssembly Binary Toolkit). It's basically a mess that requires CMake and I couldn't get it to run on WSL and I wasn't going to install MinGW. Instead there's a nice tool called WAPM from Wasmer which works like npm for webassembly packages and since it's been compiled down to webassembly we can run it in any environment. In fact we don't even need to add configuration so long as wapm is installed. We can run wax wat2wasm -- wat/mat.wat -o wasm/mat.wasm. wax is like npx for npm. If you're wondering the command we give wax is defined by the wasmer/wabt package: https://wapm.io/wasmer/wabt. Also for some reason you can't prefix local paths with ./ so wax wat2wasm -- ./wat/mat.wat doesn't work which tool me a while to figure out. Anyway this provides a nice simple compile environment if you want to work on raw WAT files.

That's the main reason we should start using WebAssembly for distributing and using packages.

Shamless plug: Wasmer [1] and WAPM [2] could help a lot on this quest!

[1]: https://wasmer.io/

[2]: https://wapm.io/

There's WAPM

If it's buildable for the WebAssembly WASI target, consider also distributing it through WAPM.

I don't know if many people have heard of it, but there's actually a WebAssembly Package Manager. It's similar to crates.io, except you upload WebAssembly binaries written in any language instead of Rust source code!

You can see this paying off with wapm, which lets you download applications that would have normally required compilation for your environment and run them anywhere with a supported runtime, which is imo pretty neat.

One step closer to the day when I can put actix-web creations up on WAPM so "Just type wax my-cool-thing to try it out" can be one of the distribution options.

I've added limited support to run wapm.io directly from the Terminal. Examples of commands that work well are wapm cowsay {Text} and wapm uuid.

> As a thought experiment, we're almost there! We could technically have `win95.img + bochs86vm.wasm + autorun.inf + msword.exe` wrapped in a "browser evaluator"

I looked into this and... holy crap! We are there. Not for modern programs quite yet, sure, but this is amazing. You can use Windows 2000 from your browser.

https://copy.sh/v86/?profile=windows2000

I think you are looking for Shadow.

https://shadow.goose.icu

Or just the whole kitchen sink. Why not?

http://copy.sh/v86/?profile=windows98

Also: https://github.com/copy/v86 - more productized browser x86 runtime, used by eg https://github.com/snaplet/postgres-wasm

Wonder if you could put all those databases in a Linux image and boot it using v86 [0], eliminating the need for a server.

[0] https://github.com/copy/v86

Trying it out in https://copy.sh/v86/?profile=kolibrios , it's also clearly a love letter to Windows 95 in particular. That could be an unstated goal here, create a very particular PC experience under very particular constraints. I don't know anything about the creator but it's very possible that this kind of work was actually their career in the 90s.

It's incredible how much work was done. Maybe this should be an internet curiosity like how TempleOS has become, though Terry's personality was a unique factor.

hmm, why would people still use VMWare? Isn't vbox open source, or even things such as https://copy.sh/v86/ would do most virtualization trick now days?

Oh, there are more OSes one can use at the parent page:

https://copy.sh/v86/

My highlights:

- First version of Windows (1.01)

- SerenityOS <3

- and even ReactOS