Empowering WebAssembly with Thin Kernel Interfaces

2023/12/06 by Arjun Ramesh, Tianshu Huang, Ben L. Titzer +1 · 6 voices · 6 citations
Computer Science · Decision Sciences · Mathematics · #Computer science #Human–computer interaction #Kernel (algebra) #Mathematics #Parallel Computing and Optimization Techniques #Scientific Computing and Data Management #Security and Verification in Computing

paper · pdf · open access · doi:10.1145/3689031.3717470

openalex publication_date 2025/03/26 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29

Abstract

Wasm is gaining popularity outside the Web as a well-specified low-level binary format with ISA portability, low memory footprint and polyglot targetability, enabling efficient in-process sandboxing of untrusted code. Despite these advantages, Wasm adoption for new domains is often hindered by the lack of many standard system interfaces which precludes reusability of existing software and slows ecosystem growth.

Discussions

• Stop Hiding the Sharp Knives: The WebAssembly Linux Interface [hn, 98 points, 57 comments]
• Yesterday we put up the camera-ready for the WALI paper! This paper introduces Thin Kernel Interfaces for WebAssembly which allows a new class of powerful applications for Wasm and building higher-le [bsky, 14 points, 2 comments]
• Stop Hiding The Sharp Knives: The WebAssembly Linux Interface [lobsters, 12 points, 9 comments]
• Stop Hiding the Sharp Knives [hn, 5 points, 1 comments]
• neat, an updated preprint on WALI, also adding an initial zephyr version, WAZI https://arxiv.org/pdf/2312.03858 [bsky, 1 points, 0 comments]
• https://arxiv.org/pdf/2312.03858.pdf [bsky, 0 points, 0 comments]

Related

• Research on WebAssembly Runtimes: A Survey
• The Promise and Pitfalls of WebAssembly: Perspectives from the Industry
• Wasm-Mutate: Fast and effective binary diversification for WebAssembly
• Cage: Hardware-Accelerated Safe WebAssembly
• Wasm SpecTec: Engineering a Formal Language Standard