JerryScriptWorkshopApril2016Summary

The first public JerryScript workshop was a great success. There was broad community attendance with about 20 people from ARM, Intel, Pebble, Samsung and the University of Szeged. The event was a one-day workshop with lots of different talks and valuable discussions.

Community update:
Pebble:

• Aiming to provide JavaScript-based widgets for Pebble watches
• Chose JerryScript after reviewing the currently available open source lightweight JavaScript engines
• Actively working with JerryScript in the last six months
• Planning to ship a JavaScript-based SDK later this year
• Pebble attendees were very enthusiastic with plenty of suggestions on how to improve the JerryScript architecture

Intel:

• Have been contributing various performance improvements over the last couple months
• Ported JerryScript to Zephyr
• Primary interest in JerryScript
• Aiming to provide IoTivity JS API on top of JerryScript (IoTivity.js)
• Targeting the Arduino 101

ARM:

• Interested in porting JerryScript to mbed OS due to interest from their partners
• Desire to improve the JavaScript debugging experience on low-end devices and lower the barrier of entry for web developers without prior embedded experience

University of Szeged:

• Presented an overview of JerryScript internals and current status in terms of performance, memory usage and code size
• This generated lots of discussion and ideas how to further improve JerryScript and also led to new insights on use cases not previously considered

Workshop conclusion:

• Need for improved communication channels, e.g. IRC, Slack and a mailing list
• Consensus to host JerryScript on a more independent organization/infrastructure to encourage wider community interest
• A lot of discussion about making JerryScript as accessible as possible, e.g. moving to more streamlined build and debug tools
• Desire to hold a JerryScript workshop quarterly