Menci / Menci/vite-plugin-wasm

Asynchronous module loading via top-level `await` breaks SharedWorkers "connect" event

Open
#37 6 comments 1 reaction 0 assignees View on GitHub

Nobody has claimed this yet.

need more info
Dominant language
JavaScript
Stars
431
Forks
27
PR merge metrics
No merged PRs in 30d

Description

Chrome has support for a feature called SharedWorkers. This allows you to run a process in the background shared between multiple tabs with the same origin. It's essentially a small extension over a webworker. The key difference between the two is that SharedWorkers have a "connect" event which fires when a new tab creates a reference to the shared worker.

Unfortunately, this event ("connect") is sent after the SharedWorker's code is evaluated but before the async function's promise resolves. Fixing this upstream in Chrome is the right solution... but I suspect not really an option in the mid-term.

I've been trying to think of what a good workaround would be... Possibly in a SharedWorker the "connect" event could be intercepted and forwarded on after async evaluation is resolved. I'm not entirely sure.

I am at least sure of this: without a solution, you can't really use SharedWorkers with WASM. (Except through some pretty gnarly hacks.)

Contributor guide

No contributing guide indexed for this repository

First steps

  1. Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
  2. Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
  3. Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
  4. Open a pull request that references the issue number.

Research direction

Start by reproducing the issue in Chrome with a SharedWorker that uses asynchronous module loading via top-level await and observe when the "connect" event fires. Investigate whether the plugin can provide a reliable workaround without relying on an upstream Chrome change; done means SharedWorkers can use WASM modules without timing hacks.

Written by the indexing model from the issue text.

Assessment

Tech stack
javascript, wasm
Domain
web-dev
Issue type
Bug
Difficulty
5/5
Estimated time
Over a week
Activity status
Stale
Clarity
Needs clarification
Newbie friendliness
25/100

Get new issues in your inbox

A short digest of beginner-friendly GitHub issues.