Heralded as the fourth standard of the web, WebAssembly, or Wasm for short, has sparked heated discussion since its origins. Wasm is an assembly-like

Can Wasm replace containers?

submited by

Style Pass

2024-11-15 14:00:15

Heralded as the fourth standard of the web, WebAssembly, or Wasm for short, has sparked heated discussion since its origins. Wasm is an assembly-like programming language, a compact binary format, and a compilation target for C, C++, C#, Go, JavaScript, Python, Rust, and others that runs at near-native speeds in a web browser. It is well-established in web development and has been inching closer to mass use outside the browser.

Wasm’s compactness, speed, portability, and security have developers excited about its possibilities on servers as well as clients, and even its potential to supplant Linux containers. But will this technology become a mainstream platform that disrupts today’s established container ecosystem?

People close to the Wasm vs. containers discussion are probably sick of seeing this 2019 tweet from Solomon Hykes, co-founder of Docker and co-founder of Dagger, replastered on every sensationalist Wasm article and presentation slide:

If WASM+WASI existed in 2008, we wouldn’t have needed to have created Docker. That’s how important it is. WebAssembly on the server is the future of computing.