Draft:BoaJS
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|  |
| Boa | |
|---|---|
| Developers | Jason Williams and contributors |
| Written in | Rust |
| Operating system | Cross-platform |
| License | MIT |
| Website | boajs |
Boa is an open-source, experimental JavaScript engine written in the Rust programming language. Created in 2017 by Jason Williams, the project aims to provide an embeddable, memory-safe, and fully compliant ECMAScript engine that can compile to WebAssembly or integrate directly into Rust applications.[1]
History
[edit]Development of Boa began in 2017 as an experimental project to explore building a JavaScript engine natively in Rust. It was first publicly introduced to the wider software developer community by Jason Williams at JSConf EU 2019 in Berlin.[2] Following the presentation, the project transitioned to an open-source community effort managed under the `boa-dev` organization.
Architecture
[edit]Unlike traditional JavaScript engines implemented in C++ (such as V8 or SpiderMonkey), Boa leverages Rust's safety guarantees to prevent memory corruption vulnerabilities without requiring FFI (Foreign Function Interface) overhead when embedded in Rust codebases.
The engine operates through a standard multi-stage execution pipeline:
- Lexer & Parser: Converts raw JavaScript source text into tokens and constructs an Abstract Syntax Tree (AST).
- Bytecode Compiler: Transforms the AST into an intermediate bytecode representation.
- Virtual Machine: Executes bytecode using a register- or stack-based execution context.
- Garbage Collection: Utilizes a custom trace-based garbage collector (`boa_gc`) to handle object allocation, lifetime management, and cycle resolution.
Features
[edit]- ECMAScript Conformance: Evaluates specification accuracy using the official ECMAScript test suite (Test262).
- WebAssembly Support: Targets `wasm32-unknown-unknown`, enabling embedded JavaScript execution within browser applications, edge workers, and sandboxed environments.
- Zero Native Dependencies: Written purely in Rust, eliminating external system-level C/C++ library dependencies.
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ↑ "Boa JavaScript Engine". boajs.dev. Retrieved 2026-08-22.
- ↑ "Building a JavaScript Engine in Rust". JSConf EU 2019. Retrieved 2026-08-22.
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