Comment by nl

11 hours ago

This seems either wrong or very uncharitable.

> Perry exposes a faithful subset of Node.js’s stdlib HTTP server modules on top of hyper + rustls + tokio-tungstenite. The whole shape — handler signature, IncomingMessage / ServerResponse properties + methods, TLS opts, ALPN-negotiated HTTP/2, WebSocket upgrade dispatch — works unmodified, so unmodified Node servers (Express / Koa / Polka / hono via @hono/node-server / etc.) compile and run natively[1]

It's pretty standard for "no runtime" to mean nothing on the device you install the compiled target app.

I think iOS development still needs Ruby for Pod installation but no one says Swift apps need a Ruby runtime for example.

[1] https://docs.perryts.com/stdlib/http.html

10 comments

nl

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ventana  11 hours ago

Well, I did indeed spend some time playing with it before writing my comment. I first tried to compile the TypeScript project I'm working on, and it happens to be an Express server. After some minor unrelated fixes required (Perry does not understand importing "fs/promises", so I fixed it to import "fs" and then taking .promises) it said it needs JS runtime, and the smallest repro I found was

  $ cat index.ts
  import * as express from 'express';
  const app = express();

which gives

  $ perry index.ts
  Collecting modules...
    JS module: express -> /private/tmp/ex/node_modules/express/index.js
  Error: build pulled in `perry-jsruntime` (QuickJS-based eval-equivalent runtime)   via the following file(s):
    - /private/tmp/ex/node_modules/express/index.js [express]
  
  `perry-jsruntime` is treated as a privileged dependency on par with adding a JIT to the binary — it re-introduces arbitrary runtime code execution and defeats Perry's structural advantage over Node. Refusing to link by default. (#499)
  
  To enable, set `perry.allowJsRuntime: true` in the host package.json, or pass `--enable-js-runtime` on the CLI for a one-off build. (Falls under `--lockdown` deny set when that flag ships — see #496.)

Maybe it's because Express is written in JavaScript with external types from @types/express, that would explain why it might need JS runtime, but it does not make things easier for me.

  • nl  10 hours ago

    Fair, but might have been worth including that in your initial comment because the docs don't mention that at all.

ozgrakkurt  6 hours ago

It is not standard for “no runtime” to mean that. For example go has a runtime that is compiled into the binary or you can google c runtime and see a million ways the word “runtime” is used with c.

pjmlp  10 hours ago

> It's pretty standard for "no runtime" to mean nothing on the device you install the compiled target app.

Only by layman that don't understand compilers.

  • lkirkwood  9 hours ago

    The tone here is a bit rude but I'm still curious: what does no runtime mean to you?

    • pjmlp  9 hours ago

      It is my tone, GenX, no minced words.

      The infrastructure required to support a programming language, startup and shutdown boilerplate, all the required functionality to support standard library features including integration points between language semantics and support code.

      Stuff like what code runs before and after main(), trap handlers for floating point arithmetic, handling of thread local storage, bind language heap handling primitives to library code, traps for handling stack overflow errors,....

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