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Show HN: Ant – A JavaScript runtime and ecosystem

antjs.org

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Re: Show HN: Ant – A JavaScript runtime and ecosystem

#111

Post by theMackabu »

ptx wrote: post #68
theMackabu wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

its ~8mb including the entire runtime and node-compat work. pretty simple to embed anywhere as well

And what are the tradesoffs? How is it so much smaller than V8 while also apparently including a package manager, a web server, a TypeScript compiler and a hypervisor?

> How is it so much smaller than V8 while also apparently including a package manager, a web server, a TypeScript compiler and a hypervisor?

Much less complex tiers of jit, no unicode ICU, and no startup js snapshot

Re: Show HN: Ant – A JavaScript runtime and ecosystem

#112

Post by reasonableklout »

nhinck2 wrote: post #85
theMackabu wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

this was flagging code from all the way back in dec of 2025, back when this project was just some idea and not what it is today. around feb thats when basically deleted the existing codebase and designed a much more reliable system from the ground up. I knew the existing code was basically pure slop, and it was not the biggest issue then, now nothing goes past me unreviewed and untested > To the author: I absolutely…

> now nothing goes past me unreviewed and untested So it's not hand-built?

OP, you will get a much better reception if you clarify that "hand built" just means you're not using existing libraries. It's a cool project, but it's disappointing to come in expecting to see a rare gem of a 100% human project in 2026 but it's really something else.

Re: Show HN: Ant – A JavaScript runtime and ecosystem

#113

Post by kamov »

bblb wrote: post #97
vips7L wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not hand-built. It’s hand prompted.

Writing code by your own hands is an esoteric hobby. We are past the slop era. This is coding now. If you're 1x, you're not a dev. I would assume by now most of the code published on Github is hand-built with LLM prompts and armies of AI agents.

Okay, so would you say LuaJIT is slop, just because it is hand coded?

Re: Show HN: Ant – A JavaScript runtime and ecosystem

#114

Post by hnlmorg »

girvo wrote: post #93
hnlmorg wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s also Adam Ant. Who was also a household name. Some people have also heard of ants of the formicidaen variety.

Yes because those are in the same web development/javascript adjacent vertical, of course!

Neither is Apache Ant not Anthropic CLI yet they’re cited a lot in this discussion too.

Re: Show HN: Ant – A JavaScript runtime and ecosystem

#115

Post by lelanthran »

rererereferred wrote: post #84
sylware wrote: post #41

Cannot access the web site: whatwg cartel web engine only. Is antjs coded in plain and simple C?

Seems like so: https://github.com/theMackabu/ant Odd choice for a vibecoded project.

> Odd choice for a vibecoded project.

Not really, there's some advantages if the viber is experienced in C.

1. When the LLM needs to figure out what functions exist, it reads only headers, not the actual implementation. IME the agent uses a fraction of tokens compared to vibing out a Java or C# project.

2. There's only a handful of common footguns in C (signed overflow, use-after-free, dereferencing NULL, etc) all of which are localised, compared to C++ which has all those C footguns plus non-localised footguns that can't be easily detected without knowing the entire program at once.

Re: Show HN: Ant – A JavaScript runtime and ecosystem

#116

Post by KaiMagnus »

armanckeser wrote: post #88
girvo wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ant in JS land is already claimed and huge too lol https://ant.design/

Tangent but what a horrible website at least on my android. Starts as light mode, suddenly shows three streched columns, turns to dark mode and the title is hidden behind the header. After years of being around how can they end up with something like this

I bounced when I saw the three broken columns but never even saw the dark mode switch. It’s that slow.

Re: Show HN: Ant – A JavaScript runtime and ecosystem

#117

Post by brabel »

steve-atx-7600 wrote: post #57
lucb1e wrote: post #37

Why call it "Ant" and not "Antjs" or "Ant.js" when there is already Ant from Apache? https://ant.apache.org

Yes. You would only name it ant if you wanted to taint the first impression of anyone that’s been coding for a couple decades or more.

Or if you have only started in the last few years and never heard of those older projects.

Re: Show HN: Ant – A JavaScript runtime and ecosystem

#118

Post by dminik »

magicalist wrote: post #50
tekacs wrote: post #28

I code with AI all day, every day. But I do think that it's worth pointing to this issue (from March). The author has said that they've redone it since, but the "from-scratch hand-built" framing specifically – for me – somewhat grates given the original heavy lifting from an existing AGPL codebase. https://github.com/cesanta/elk/issues/75 I want to acknowledge that the original authors don't seem to have minded too m…

Ok, but this post: https://themackabu.dev/blog/js-in-one-month isn't the post of someone who just implemented a js engine (it reads like someone who asked an LLM to write a blog post about the git log of a different LLM which was apparently lifting code from a different js engine...) It's a bit hard to understand what's going on here, but definitely hard to trust the project.

Apparently prompting LLMs is now "survival mode".

Re: Show HN: Ant – A JavaScript runtime and ecosystem

#119

Post by normie3000 »

latchkey wrote: post #109
lucb1e wrote: post #37

Why call it "Ant" and not "Antjs" or "Ant.js" when there is already Ant from Apache? https://ant.apache.org

I'm the first user and contributor to Apache Ant outside of Sun Microsystems when James gave it to me, and I could care less that someone else used the same name.

Could or couldn't?

Re: Show HN: Ant – A JavaScript runtime and ecosystem

#120

Post by h1696UOuk »

I get the runtime, the engine, and the colony as a monetization angle. What I don't get is:

- Another registry (looks like jsr.io)? - Another package manager - Ant Desktop? - Sandboxes? - treatjs (what even is that)?

I'd love to see a JS runtime that does one thing: run JavaScript. I don't get why everyone is aiming for an all-in-one toolbox. To me this project already seems convoluted.

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