Webvm: Virtual Machine for the Web

#1

Post by thunderbong » Wed, Nov 20, 2024, 2:45 AM UTC

Webvm: Virtual Machine for the Web
github.com

Re: Webvm: Virtual Machine for the Web

#2

Post by benchmarkist » Wed, Nov 20, 2024, 3:13 AM UTC

Networking over websockets with tailscale is a nice touch.

Re: Webvm: Virtual Machine for the Web

#3

Post by westurner » Wed, Nov 20, 2024, 3:21 AM UTC

/? "webvm" jupyter: https://www.google.com/search?q=%22webvm%22+jupyter

- "Is WebVM a potential solution to "JupyterLite doesn't have a bash/zsh shell"?" https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30167403#30168491 :

- [ ] "ENH: Terminal and Shell: BusyBox, bash/zsh, git; WebVM," https://github.com/jupyterlite/jupyterlite/issues/949

And then now WASM containers in the browser FWIU

Re: Webvm: Virtual Machine for the Web

#4

Post by rahimnathwani » Wed, Nov 20, 2024, 3:30 AM UTC

Previous discussion with 632 points: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40940225

Re: Webvm: Virtual Machine for the Web

#5

Post by colesantiago » Wed, Nov 20, 2024, 3:33 AM UTC

duplicate: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40940225

Re: Webvm: Virtual Machine for the Web

#6

Post by James_K » Wed, Nov 20, 2024, 3:54 AM UTC

Sad to see Linux turning into a web app. I thought they'd be smart enough to avoid this sort of trend. Hope they continue to support the desktop version.

Re: Webvm: Virtual Machine for the Web

#7

Post by zb3 » Wed, Nov 20, 2024, 4:09 AM UTC

Note this repository doesn't include source for CheerpX, which is the main component of WebVM.

Re: Webvm: Virtual Machine for the Web

#8

Post by 8n4vidtmkvmk » Wed, Nov 20, 2024, 4:10 AM UTC

James_K wrote: post #6

Sad to see Linux turning into a web app. I thought they'd be smart enough to avoid this sort of trend. Hope they continue to support the desktop version.

Unless Linus himself is behind this project, I don't think you have anything to worry about.

Re: Webvm: Virtual Machine for the Web

#9

Post by Uptrenda » Wed, Nov 20, 2024, 4:16 AM UTC

I think its cool but am I the only one that doesn't really think the web is a good platform for this? Like, VM stuff needs to be as close to bare metal as possible to be fast. There's special processor features that make virtualisation work well. It's amazingly efficient now. You can vastly over-allocate your hardware between VMs with good modern virtualisation software because they're so damn efficient that they only utilise CPU and memory when they need it. That means they're not just like allocated 4 GBs if you allocate 4 GB to the VM.

All these little optimisations... just aren't going to work well in a browser. I mean, I can already see that alpine (an extremely lightweight VM that I've had boot instantly with vagrant and other such stuff) is slow here. It's a cool hack. I just prefer things to be practical...

Re: Webvm: Virtual Machine for the Web

#10

Post by athrowaway3z » Wed, Nov 20, 2024, 4:20 AM UTC

James_K wrote: post #6

Sad to see Linux turning into a web app. I thought they'd be smart enough to avoid this sort of trend. Hope they continue to support the desktop version.

I'm waiting for the IPhone app.