🌐 Web: WHATWG & TC39 Extensions for the BEAM

A protocol-agnostic, zero-buffer suite of Web Standard APIs for Elixir.

🚀 Beyond Fetch: A Standardized Runtime

Web provides a predictable, spec-pure interface for high-concurrency systems. [cite_start]While most Elixir libraries buffer data into memory by default, Web is built for Zero-Buffer Streaming[cite: 20]. By implementing WHATWG and TC39 standards as Native Process-backed entities (:gen_statem), Web ensures your applications remain responsive even when handling gigabytes of data.

Why Standards on the BEAM?

• Predictability: 100% WPT compliance for core primitives like URL and MIME.
• Flow Control: TC39-aligned concurrency management via Web.Governor.
• Context Propagation: Ambient AsyncContext for metadata that survives process boundaries.
• Zero-Buffer Performance: Native streaming with backpressure-aware engines.

🛠 The "Web-First" DSL

If you’ve used the modern Web API in a browser, you already know how to use this library. We've mapped those standards to idiomatic Elixir.

defmodule GitHub do
  use Web

  @spec repositories(String.t()) :: Promise.t()
  def repositories(query \\ "elixir") do
    url = URL.new("https://api.github.com/search/repositories")
    
    params = 
      URL.search_params(url)
      |> URLSearchParams.set("q", query)
      |> URLSearchParams.append("sort", "stars")

    url = URL.search(url, URLSearchParams.to_string(params))

    headers = Headers.new(%{
      "Accept" => "application/vnd.github.v3+json"
    })

    request = Request.new(url, 
      method: "GET",
      headers: headers,
      redirect: "follow",
      signal: AbortSignal.timeout(30_000)
    )

    # 3. Fetch and return the Promise of the Response
    fetch(request) |> Promise.then(&Response.json/1)
  end
end

Web.await(GitHub.repositories())

📖 API Usage & Examples

⚡ Concurrency & Async Logic

Web.fetch remains spec-pure. To limit concurrency, apply the TC39 proposal-aligned Governor API to throttle your work explicitly.

use Web

# Limit to 2 concurrent operations globally
governor = CountingGovernor.new(2)

requests =
  for url <- ["https://a.com", "https://b.com", "https://c.com"] do
    Governor.with(governor, fn ->
      fetch(url)
    end)
  end

responses = await(Promise.all(requests))

Async APIs return %Web.Promise{} values. Promise executors capture the current Web.AsyncContext, so logger metadata and signals flow into spawned tasks automatically.

use Web

response = await fetch("https://api.github.com/zen")
text = await Response.text(response)

# Composite multiple async operations
pair = await Promise.all([
  Promise.resolve(:ok),
  Promise.resolve(text)
])

Web.AsyncContext carries scoped values across promise and stream task boundaries.

use Web

request_id = AsyncContext.Variable.new("request_id")

AsyncContext.Variable.run(request_id, "req-42", fn ->
  # Spawning a task or promise here still has access to the request_id
  await(Promise.resolve(AsyncContext.Variable.get(request_id)))
end)
# => "req-42"

🌊 Zero-Buffer Streaming

Managed processes that provide data with spec-compliant backpressure.

# Create a stream from any enumerable
source = ReadableStream.from(["chunk1", "chunk2"])

# Split one stream into two independent branches (Zero-copy)
{branch_a, branch_b} = ReadableStream.tee(source)

# Composable pipelines with pipe_through
upper =
  source
  |> ReadableStream.pipe_through(TransformStream.new(%{
      transform: fn chunk, controller ->
        ReadableStreamDefaultController.enqueue(controller, String.upcase(chunk))
      end
     }))

Standard-compliant gzip/deflate and UTF-8 encoding that works across streamed chunk boundaries.

source = ReadableStream.from(["Hello, ", "🌍"])

encoded =
  source
  |> ReadableStream.pipe_through(TextEncoderStream.new())
  |> ReadableStream.pipe_through(CompressionStream.new("gzip"))
  |> ReadableStream.pipe_through(DecompressionStream.new("gzip"))
  |> ReadableStream.pipe_through(TextDecoderStream.new())

await(Response.text(Response.new(body: encoded)))
# => "Hello, 🌍"

🌍 Data & Metadata

Strict WHATWG URL parsing with ordered search params, IDNA host handling, and rclone-style URL support.

# WHATWG-style URL parsing
url = URL.new("https://user:pass@example.com:8080/p/a/t/h?query=string#hash")

# URLPattern for matching and ambient route param injection
pattern = URLPattern.new(%{pathname: "/users/:id"})

URLPattern.match_context(pattern, "https://example.com/users/42", fn ->
  # Automatically retrieves captured "id" => "42" from context
  AsyncContext.Variable.get(URLPattern.params())
end)

Standard containers that handle MIME-aware sniffing and live multipart iteration.

# MIME-aware blobs sniff generic binaries
html = Response.new(
  body: "<!doctype html><html>...",
  headers: [{"content-type", "application/octet-stream"}]
)

await(Response.blob(html)).type # => "text/html"

# Live FormData iteration with O(1) memory usage
form = await(Response.form_data(response))
Enum.to_list(form)

🧪 Testing & Compliance

Web combines focused JSON data from Web Platform Tests (WPT) with property tests and strict coverage gates.

# Run the full compliance suite
mix test --cover

Built with ❤️ for the Elixir community.