Validation errors were bit of an issue. Especially because Binaryen constructs an internal IR that remains opaque until we emit the Wasm text. I did consider Wizard for my project but settled on Wasmtime because I needed WASI support.

My major pain point was the documentation. The binaryen.js API reference¹ is a list of function signatures. Maybe this makes sense to someone more experienced but I found it hard to understand initially. There are no explanation of what the parameters mean. For example, the following is the only information the reference provides for compiling an `if` statement:

  Module#if(condition: Expression, ifTrue: Expression, ifFalse?: Expression): Expression

In contrast, the Wasm instruction reference on MDN² is amazing. WASI again suffers from the same documentation issues. I didn't find any official resource on how to use `fd_write` for example. Thankfully I found this blog post³.

Wasm feels more inaccessible that other projects. The everyday programmer shouldn't be expected to understand PL research topics when they are trying to do something with it. I understand that's not the intention but this is what it feels like.

1. https://github.com/WebAssembly/binaryen/wiki/binaryen.js-API

2. https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/WebAssembly/Referen...

3. https://tty4.dev/development/wasi-load-fd-write/