Serverless

AI as a Service: Image Classification Using MobileNet

MobileNet is a class of Convolutional Neural Networks (CNN) models for computer vision applications. The most common application for MobileNet models is image classification. You can train (or retrain) a MobileNet model to recognize objects that are interesting to your application (e.g., to classify birds in a bird watching application). Second State FaaS provides a Rust API to run Tensorflow-based MobileNet models at native speeds. In this article, we will use a MobileNet model trained from the ImageNet dataset as an example.…

Internet of Functions: HTTP Proxy

One of the limitations of the WebAssembly VM is that it provides no built-in support for network applications. In the web browser or in Node.js, it is possible to call the host JavaScript to perform networking tasks. But of course, a JavaScript bridge is slow, highly dependent on the host platform (i.e., not portable), and requires the developer to use JavaScript. In the SSVM, we have a new way to do this.…

Internet of Functions: webhooks

A FaaS function is designed to perform a unit of specialized work. It is part of a larger Internet-based system. The vision of serverless computing is build fully fledged web applications with a network of functions and storage services. We need to chain FaaS functions, web gateways, and messaging queues together to create pipelines for data processing. The Second State FaaS supports using webhooks as function input and output. The FaaS function can take web-based content as input arguments, and send the return value to another web service or function.…

Mixing Text and Binary Data in Call Arguments

In the previous two articles, we have learnt how to use text, JSON, binary data, and even webhook resources as FaaS function call arguments. But we have also seen the need to mix multiple arguments in a single function call. In this article, we will demonstrate how to do that. The source code for the custom watermark example in this article is available on Github. Watermark an image The Rust function takes two call arguments: a string for the watermark text, and a byte array for an image (in a &[u8]).…

Getting Started with Function as A Service in Rust

Function as a Service (FaaS) is one of the fastest growing areas of cloud computing. FaaS allows developers to focus on the code. Once the developer uploads the code, the FaaS takes care of deployment, service availability, and scalability. The developer only pays for resources the service uses, not reserved idle time. This approach, known as serverless computing, is the way to build inter-connected and microservice-based applications. The result are fast development turn around, easy deployment, high availability, infinite scalability, at low cost.…

Use Binary Data as Function Input and Output

In the previous article, we demonstrated how a Second State FaaS function could handle text-based input and output. Through JSON support, we can encode arbitrary data types into text. However, for functions focused on media processing, binary-based input and output is far more efficient and more performant. In this article, we will show you how to use a Second State FaaS function to add watermark to an image. The source code for the watermark example in this article is available on Github.…

WebAssembly vs native code

WebAssembly aims to drastically improve your application performance, safety, and developer productivity. It replaces native code with a managed container and finely grained security model. Why do we program in native code in 2020? In the past several years, CPU speed has pretty much stopped improving. At the same time, AI, big data, and blockchain have all create huge demands for more computing power. So far, the solution has been more and more native code in our software.…

开发者活动：用 Rust 写 Serverless 函数

了解如何在 Rust 中创建用于媒体处理、机器学习和 AI 的高性能 serverless 函数。完成这个挑战，即可获得丰厚奖品！终极大奖 最新款的 Mac mini 等你来拿。 #1 用 Rust 写一个 serverless function 首…

🚀 WebAssembly is the perfect runtime for server-side (or serverless) applications

In a recent paper on Science, MIT professor Leiserson et al. noted that, as Moore's Law stalled, “practically all industries will face challenges to their productivity”. But, while semiconductor miniaturization hits the quantum limit, the good news is that “there’s plenty of room at the top”. The drivers for growth will be from more efficient software, new algorithms, and specialized hardware. The paper demonstrated that machine learning tasks can run 60,000x times faster when we replace Python with native code and specialized hardware.…