Float16 on TypedArrays, DataView, Math.hfround

🦋 Proposals
1

Any progress on this Stage 1 proposal?

At least, IMHO, DateView#{get, set}Float16 should go ahead.

See also:
https://esdiscuss.org/topic/float16array

2

Maybe make Float16Array optional for WebGPU just like SharedArrayBuffer?

FYI:

Leo Balter (2 years ago)
I've been trying to get some traction for the feature with implementors but it's being hard to get everyone positive about this being a native implementation rather than a non-native custom API.

https://esdiscuss.org/topic/float16array#content-18

3

Float16Array is required in Canvas Floating Point Color Values.

4

The ColorWeb CG therefore suggests:

  1. Moving ahead with
    https://github.com/w3c/ColorWeb-CG/blob/main/canvas_float.md in its current form, with unorm8 and float32 as options for readback.

  2. In parallel, working on adding Float16Array to ECMAScript, and prototyping it in browsers.

  3. Specifying a "float16" enum in ImageDataColorType once implementation experience has been achieved with Float16Array. Applications can feature-detect its support in browsers by catching exceptions raised by getImageData or createImageData.

https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-colorweb/2022Dec/0014.html

5

What is the timeframe for this?

6

It's shipped in Firefox, with implementations underway in both Chrome and Safari. You can find links to the relevant issues here.

As for changes to Canvas etc, those are handled by a different organizations. For Canvas, see here.

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7

Thoughts on adding similar instructions to wasm? Arithmetic, conversion, math funcs, etc

8

TC39 isn't in charge of wasm either, but there's an issue at Proposal: FP16 value type and operations · Issue #1497 · WebAssembly/design · GitHub. Hasn't gotten much engagement so far but if you have a concrete use case to write up in that issue that can help drive interest.

9

I'm gonna be a pain and revive this topic
Some good news, Float16Array has made it to most browsers a few weeks ago. Node is still left hanging, but it seems like it's on its way. We also have Math.f16round and DataView#{getFloat16,setFloat16}

1 Like