How PyScript and Goscript Bring Python and Go to the Browser with WebAssembly

Anaconda's developer recently released PyScript , a framework that allows developers to mix Python code directly within HTML, often dubbed the “Python version of JSP.” PyScript runs on WebAssembly, built on Pyodide, which compiles the CPython 3.8 interpreter to WebAssembly, enabling Python execution in web browsers.

Similarly, developers have created a Go playground at https://goscript.dev that runs Go code in the browser using Goscript, which also relies on WebAssembly.

Goscript is an unofficial implementation of the Go language specification, designed for embedding or wrapping Rust projects, offering a simpler way to call underlying Rust code, similar to how Lua is used with Redis or Python with NumPy.

Goscript consists of six main components: parser converts source code into an AST, ported from the official Go code. type checker performs type inference and checking based on the AST, also ported from Go. codegen generates bytecode from the AST and type information. vm executes the generated bytecode. std provides the standard library, ported from Go's official libraries. engine includes the native part of the standard library with simple wrappers.

Goscript implements almost all Go features (pre‑1.18, thus without generics) and includes portions of the official libraries. Its test suite can be viewed at the project's GitHub repository, and the full source code is available there as well.