[webkit-dev] Implement Geometry Interfaces

[Benjamin Poulain]

On 6/12/14, 11:24 AM, Dirk Schulze wrote:
> I would like to implement the Geometry Interfaces spec in WebKit[1]. The spec defines a couple of interfaces like DOMPoint, DOMRect, DOMQuad and DOMMatrix. These interfaces are more or less specified versions of proprietary interfaces like WebKitPoint or WebKitCSSMatrix as well as old APIs like SVGPoint, SVGRect or SVGMatrix that get unified between HTML/CSS and SVG. The specification progressed fast and is going to LC within the next weeks. I am going to start with DOMPoint/DOMPointReadOnly and DOMRect/DOMRectReadOnly and get to the other interfaces one by one. With the exception of DOMMatrix, all interfaces are implemented behind a runtime flag in Mozilla Gecko. DOMMatrix will be implemented in Gecko soon.
>
> These interfaces will be used by other specifications like CSS OM View or SVG. I am going to implement these APIs behind a compiler flag called GEOMETRY. I would like to enable the compiler flag by default for better testing. Production builds should disable the compiler flag. I will pull out stable APIs from the flag when appropriate.

This is such a weird idea.

Ideally, the JavaScript compiler should optimize the handling of all 
those types. By having them in the DOM, you will make those 
optimizations a lot harder to make.

Wouldn't those type suffer the same fate as WebKitCSSMatrix: being 
inefficient on a large scale?

What is the rationale for not having JavaScript primitive types?

Benjamin