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No installation required: how WebAssembly is changing scientific computing

Enabling code execution in the web browser, the multilanguage tool is powerful but complicated.
  1. Jeffrey M. Perkel
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Cartoon of a hand passing through a browser window and manipulating pieces of code within.

Illustration: The Project Twins

In late 2021, midway through the COVID-19 pandemic, George Stagg was preparing to give exams to his mathematics and statistics students at the University of Newcastle, UK. Some would use laptops, others would opt for tablets or mobile phones. Not all of them could even use the programming language that was the subject of the test: the statistical language R. “We had no control, really, over what devices those students were using,” says Stagg.

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Nature 627, 455-456 (2024)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-024-00725-1

Updates & Corrections

  • Correction 14 March 2024: This Technology feature erroneously stated that data are never transferred to an external server with WebAssembly. In fact, they can be; it is just not required. Also, it wrongly stated that WebAssembly is limited to 32-bit numbers. It can handle 64-bit numbers, but is limited to 32-bit memory addresses.

References

  1. Ji, D., Aboukhalil, R. & Moshiri, N. Bioinformatics 40, btae018 (2024).

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  2. Usher, W. & Pascucci, V. Preprint at arXiv https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2009.03254 (2020).

  3. Herzberger, L. et al. Preprint at arXiv https://doi.org/10.48550/arXiv.2309.04393 (2023).

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