Simon Willison: browser-compat-db — MDN compat as SQLite served via GitHub CDN

Main idea

Willison shipped simonw/browser-compat-db: a converter that turns Mozilla's browser compatibility data into queryable SQLite, distributed via GitHub Releases with open CORS. The interesting angle — the automation pipeline itself was built with AI-assisted programming.

Context

Continues his long-running demonstration of "vibe-coded" infra/data utilities and publishing structured open data. Part of his daily linkblog thread on LLM tools in practice.

Why it matters

A showcase of how a single dev uses LLMs to rapidly build production utilities while leaning on existing infra (GitHub Releases) as CDN. A pattern for small open-data projects without server costs.

Details / arguments

• GitHub Releases as a free CDN with permissive CORS for cross-origin browser access
• Pipeline automation generated and iterated via LLM assistance
• Goal: make MDN compat data trivially queryable from any frontend