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89 lines
4.2 KiB
Markdown
89 lines
4.2 KiB
Markdown
# Rusty V8 Binding
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V8 Version: 8.1.108
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[](https://github.com/denoland/rusty_v8/actions)
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[](https://crates.io/crates/rusty_v8)
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[](https://docs.rs/rusty_v8)
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## Goals
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1. Provide high quality Rust bindings to [V8's C++
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API](https://cs.chromium.org/chromium/src/v8/include/v8.h). The API should
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match the original API as closely as possible
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2. Do not introduce additional call overhead. (For example, previous attempts at
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Rust V8 bindings forced the use of Persistent handles.)
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3. Do not rely on a binary `libv8.a` built outside of cargo. V8 is a very large
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project (over 600,000 lines of C++) which often takes 30 minutes to compile.
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Furthermore, V8 relies on Chromium's bespoke build system (gn + ninja) which is
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not easy to use outside of Chromium. For this reason many attempts to bind to V8
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rely on pre-built binaries that are built separately from the binding itself.
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While this is simple, it makes upgrading V8 difficult, it makes CI difficult, it
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makes producing builds with different configurations difficult, and it is a
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security concern since binary blobs can hide malicious code. For this reason we
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believe it is imperative to build V8 from source code during "cargo build".
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4. Publish the crate on crates.io and allow docs.rs to generate documentation.
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Due to the complexity and size of V8's build, this is nontrivial. For example
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the crate size must be kept under 10 MiB in order to publish.
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## Build
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Use `cargo build -vv` to build the crate.
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Depends on Python 2.7, not Python 3. [Do not open issues with us regarding
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Python 3; it's something that must be fixed in
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Chromium.](https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=942720).
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For linux builds: glib-2.0 development files need to be installed such that
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pkg-config can find them. On Ubuntu, run `sudo apt install libglib2.0-dev` to
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install them.
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The build depends on several binary tools: `gn`, `ninja` and a recent version
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of `clang` (V8 relies on bleeding edge features). Because these are not
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generally available they are automatically download during the build by default.
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It should be possible to opt out of the gn and ninja download by specifying the
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`$GN` and `$NINJA` environmental variables. The clang download can be skipped by
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providing a `$CLANG_BASE_PATH` environmental variable pointing to a recent
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`llvm`/`clang` installation (currently LLVM v8.0+ or Apple clang v11.0+).
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You could also pass in additional arguments to `gn` by setting the `$GN_ARGS`
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environmental variable.
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Env vars used in build.rs: `SCCACHE`, `GN`, `NINJA`, `CLANG_BASE_PATH`, `GN_ARGS`
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## FAQ
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**Building V8 takes over 30 minutes, this is too slow for me to use this crate.
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What should I do?**
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Install [sccache](https://github.com/mozilla/sccache). Our build scripts will
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detect and use sccache. Set the `$SCCACHE` environmental variable if it's not in
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your path.
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**What are all these random directories for like `build` and `buildtools` are
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these really necessary?**
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In order to build V8 from source code, we must provide a certain directory
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structure with some git submodules from Chromium. We welcome any simplifications
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to the code base, but this is a structure we have found after many failed
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attempts that carefully balances the requirements of cargo crates and
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GN/Ninja.
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**V8 has a very large API with hundreds of methods. Why don't you automate the
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generation of this binding code?**
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In the limit we would like to auto-generate bindings. We have actually started
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down this route several times, however due to many excentric features of the V8
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API, this has not proven successful. Therefore we are proceeding in a
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brute-force fashion for now, focusing on solving our stated goals first. We hope
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to auto-generate bindings in the future.
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**Why are you building this?**
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This is to support [the Deno project](https://deno.land/). We previously have
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gotten away with a simpler high-level Rust binding to V8 called
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[libdeno](https://github.com/denoland/deno/tree/32937251315493ef2c3b42dd29340e8a34501aa4/core/libdeno).
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But as Deno has matured we've found ourselves continually needing access to an
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increasing amount of V8's API in Rust.
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