Make the WASM location configurable

[ifcjs]

Make the WASM location configurable

[tomvandig]

Would vote against this, the WASM file as a standalone web resource enables browsers to cache the compiled code, reducing subsequent startup times by skipping compilation. More info here: https://v8.dev/blog/wasm-code-caching

I am by no means a chrome expert, but I expect this caching to break if we somehow bundle the wasm inside the js resource, they specifically mention:

Cached compiled code is associated with the URL of the .wasm resource, which makes it easy to look up without having to scan the actual resource. This means that changing the URL of a resource (including any query parameters!) creates a new entry in our resource cache, which also requires a complete recompile and creates a new code cache entry.

Could be this info is out of date though, no idea.

[xeolabs]

I wonder if there is a way to actually bundle/encapsulate web-ifc.wasm inside web-ifc-api.js and web-ifc-api-node.js?

[agviegas]

I wish there was a way, it would be definitely cleaner 🤔 But as far as I know, the WASM file is not interpreted the same way as JS (they are precompiled), so I suspect that for that we need to do a couple of reverse-engineering hacks (e. g. generate the WASM file in runtime). Would this runtime-generation be worth for eliminating the wasm file? Honestly, I have no idea.

[vegarringdal]

have a look at this:

https://github.com/mrdoob/three.js/blob/dev/examples/jsm/libs/meshopt_decoder.module.js#L8-L15

isnt the wasm code here ?

[agviegas]

Hum, might be. Feel free to dig into this, could be nice if it removes the WASM file handling!