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Browser Functions: A serverless platform using Web Browser execution engines

reticulation 7y ago
What a brilliant idea... almost a Why Didn't I Think of That Idea!
ksec 7y ago
Wouldn't it be very memory inefficient? A browser "tab" isn't exactly a small amount of resource. And I remember there were quite a few problems with headless browser not being perfect ( Although I think that was quite a while ago so things might have improved ) However I do love the idea of Browser Function! It has been a long time since I have been excited with any Web Development tech. So I just need some time to sink in my excitement.
- richardyoung00 7y ago
  Chrome seems to handle memory quite well in headless mode at any rate. The memory footprint isn't tiny, but it seems a fair bit smaller than the container based approaches used by other serverless systems.
  - throwGuardian 7y ago
    Isn't this still wrapped in a container. I would assume a commercial deployment would need this isolation - after all chrome allows toggling feature flags, which could bleed across instances if not containerized. The big benefit to this approach is the availability of WebApis in a Faas environment.
    - richardyoung00 7y ago
      I don't think you need the extra layer of isolation. Browser tabs are isolated pretty well if they are running different sites. Chrome's spectre mitigations will also help to isolate functions from one another https://security.googleblog.com/2018/07/mitigating-spectre-with-site-isolation.html https://security.googleblog.com/2018/07/mitigating-spectre-w...
Sonata 7y ago
This sounds similar to how Cloudflare Workers work - using the V8 isolate technology built for Chrome to provide secure isolation of backend processes without the overhead of VMs or even containers.
- jgrahamc 7y ago
  Yes. This is something like Cloudflare Workers (except we built a deep embedding of V8 rather than relying on the browser infrastructure). https://workers.cloudflare.com/ https://workers.cloudflare.com/ Plus we have a distributed KV store to go with the code execution environment.
  - richardyoung00 7y ago
    Our main reason for relying on the full browser is to not be tied to a specific browser engine, and to be able to benefit from browser security updates really easily, but there are obviously some challenges to this approach.
    - jgrahamc 7y ago
      Makes sense. Certainly not dissing your approach!

What a brilliant idea... almost a Why Didn't I Think of That Idea!

ksec 7y ago

Wouldn't it be very memory inefficient? A browser "tab" isn't exactly a small amount of resource. And I remember there were quite a few problems with headless browser not being perfect ( Although I think that was quite a while ago so things might have improved ) However I do love the idea of Browser Function! It has been a long time since I have been excited with any Web Development tech. So I just need some time to sink in my excitement.

richardyoung00 7y ago
Chrome seems to handle memory quite well in headless mode at any rate. The memory footprint isn't tiny, but it seems a fair bit smaller than the container based approaches used by other serverless systems.
- throwGuardian 7y ago
  Isn't this still wrapped in a container. I would assume a commercial deployment would need this isolation - after all chrome allows toggling feature flags, which could bleed across instances if not containerized. The big benefit to this approach is the availability of WebApis in a Faas environment.
  - richardyoung00 7y ago
    I don't think you need the extra layer of isolation. Browser tabs are isolated pretty well if they are running different sites. Chrome's spectre mitigations will also help to isolate functions from one another https://security.googleblog.com/2018/07/mitigating-spectre-with-site-isolation.html https://security.googleblog.com/2018/07/mitigating-spectre-w...

Sonata 7y ago

This sounds similar to how Cloudflare Workers work - using the V8 isolate technology built for Chrome to provide secure isolation of backend processes without the overhead of VMs or even containers.

jgrahamc 7y ago
Yes. This is something like Cloudflare Workers (except we built a deep embedding of V8 rather than relying on the browser infrastructure). https://workers.cloudflare.com/ https://workers.cloudflare.com/ Plus we have a distributed KV store to go with the code execution environment.
- richardyoung00 7y ago
  Our main reason for relying on the full browser is to not be tied to a specific browser engine, and to be able to benefit from browser security updates really easily, but there are obviously some challenges to this approach.
  - jgrahamc 7y ago
    Makes sense. Certainly not dissing your approach!