WebAssembly from the Ground Up with Patrick Dubroy and Mariano Guerra

Oct 20, 2025

Get ready for WasmAssembly episode 16! Host Thomas Steiner sits down with Patrick Dubroy and Mariano Guerra, authors of the ebook "WebAssembly from the Ground Up." Discover how they're teaching Wasm by building a compiler in JavaScript, why writing WebAssembly by hand is crucial, and their thoughts on the future of compiler education. Tune in to learn about Ohm, the surprising omission of WAT, and what a potential part 2 of their book might cover!

Chapters:
0:00 - Welcoming Patrick and Mariano, authors of "WebAssembly from the Ground Up
1:34 - How the book came to be
5:34 - How the co-authors met
9:13 - Who should learn WebAssembly by actually writing it?
13:13 -  Is it time to retire the Dragon Book?
17:42 - What is Ohm, what it has to do with the programming language Wafer, and why they chose Ohm for the book
27:22 - Compiling Ohm grammars to Wasm
30:22 - The on-purpose omission of the Wasm text format WAT
38:27 - A potential part 2 of the book
43:36 - The biggest surprise when writing the book
50:42 - Wasm, but not

Resources:

• Mariano Guerra on LinkedIn: https://goo.gle/4gtIq3e 

• Patrick Dubroy on LinkedIn: https://goo.gle/46t7Ucx 

• WebAssembly from the Ground Up: https://goo.gle/3IvlqnT 

• Learn WebAssembly: https://goo.gle/46v50E0 

• WebAssembly website Issue: Consider adding a pure Wasm tutorial: https://goo.gle/46MlMzK 

• Let's Build a Compiler, by Jack Crenshaw: https://goo.gle/4gwQGzz 

• Simpletron Machine Language and Compiler from Deitel’s Java book: https://goo.gle/4nK5CNf 

• Little Riak Core Book: https://goo.gle/48rMNtF  

• Failed PR "Initial tests for globals" to the Wasm spec:https://goo.gle/3IwfQ4I 

• Short lived "WebAssembly Weekly" newsletter: https://goo.gle/3IgQYOp 

• The Dragon Book: https://goo.gle/4pLnYPM 

• Ohm: https://goo.gle/3VWpu3B 

• Human Advancement Research Community (HARC):https://goo.gle/3Iqbf47 

• Communications Design Group (CDG):https://goo.gle/4px8zlK 

• Forth dialect implemented in C, JavaScript, WebAssembly and compiled from C to asm.js and WebAssembly: https://goo.gle/3KvZLfV 

• Minimal Object Oriented runtime in WAT and WasmGC:https://goo.gle/4nxxS5m 

• wasm-tools: https://goo.gle/4nyisxQ 

• Apple's Pascal "syntax" poster: https://goo.gle/4mvhX6X 

• Niklaus Wirth: https://goo.gle/424Bzax 

• Lilith Computer: https://goo.gle/4nECeru 

• Oberon System: https://goo.gle/4pvyP03 

• Bill Hader on feedback: https://goo.gle/3K9R76U 

• How Julia Evans asks for feedback: https://goo.gle/4gxwFZv 

• Patrick's blog post "Reflections on writing a book": https://goo.gle/4gx3Jkk 

• Quarterback: https://goo.gle/4gvIcc5 

• Max Bernstein's blog: https://goo.gle/46vlwUD 

• Thorsten Ball's newsletter: https://goo.gle/4pvoWzl 

• Gleam Programming Language: https://goo.gle/46H66hj 

• Sonic Pi: https://goo.gle/3I6z6Wv 

• Future of Coding Newsletter: https://goo.gle/3Isd4xi 

• Patrick Dubroy on Bluesky: https://goo.gle/3VZ6v8C  

• Patrick Dubroy on Mastodon: https://goo.gle/4pvzazR 

• Mariano Guerra on Bluesky: https://goo.gle/4pxInYa 

• Mariano Guerra on Mastodon: https://goo.gle/4n6OXn3 

• WebAssembly from the Ground Up ebook on Bluesky: https://goo.gle/4prbIUd 

• WebAssembly from the Ground Up ebook on Mastodon: https://goo.gle/4gxBwtX