Summary

In this chapter, we discussed the history of WebAssembly with regard to the technologies that led to its creation. A detailed overview of the definition of WebAssembly was provided to allow for a greater understanding of the underlying technologies involved.

The Core Specification, JavaScript API, and Web API were presented as important elements of WebAssembly and demonstrate how the technology will evolve. We also reviewed potentials use cases, currently supported languages, and tools that enable the use of non-supported languages.

The limitations of WebAssembly are the absence of GC, the inability to communicate directly with the DOM, and the lack of support for older browsers. These were discussed to convey the newness of the technology and shed light on some of its shortcomings. Finally, we discussed Emscripten's role in the development process and where it fits into the WebAssembly development workflow.

In Chapter 2, Elements of WebAssembly - Wat, Wasm, and the JavaScript API, we'll be diving deeper into the elements that make up WebAssembly: the WebAssembly text format (Wat), binary format (Wasm), JavaScript, and Web APIs.