@nikso/tu

v0.0.4

Published

2 years ago

An implementation of the Io programming language in Javascript

Downloads

0High
0Medium
0Low

nikso

io tu lang language

Tu language

An experimental implementation of the Io language in Javascript.

Account := Object clone do(
  balance := 0.0
  deposit := method(v,  balance = balance + v)
  show := method(write("Account balance: $", balance, "\n"))
)

"Inital: " print
Account show

"Depositing $10\n" print
Account deposit(10.0)

"Final: " print
Account show

:warning: This is a hobby work in progress. :warning: many things are not yet implemented, and the API is subject to change.

Installation

To install globally, run:

npm install -g @nikso/tu

Using the REPL

You can now start an interactive session with tu:

$ tu
⟩ a := 1 + 1
2
⟩ a + 40
42

Using in the browser

You can also use Tu in the browser. To do so, you can use the tu.js file in the dist folder. You can also use the tu.cjs file for CommonJS.

Alternatively, you can also use the index.mjs file in the root folder. This is the same as the tu.js file, but it is written in ES6 modules.

<html>
  <body>
    <script type="module">
      import { createEnvironment } from './index.mjs';

      const env = createEnvironment();
      window.Lobby = env.Lobby;
      window.tu = env.tu;

      const result = await tu`
        a := 1 + 1
        a + 40
      `;

      console.log(result); // 42
    </script>
  </body>
</html>

Development

Clone this repository and run:

npm install to install the dependencies
npm run build to build the project dependencies in dist
npm run dev to serve the root folder
open http://localhost:3000 in your browser
open the devtools console to see the output of tests and use tu

You can also run npm link -g to get a tu command wich will use the local version of the project.

How does it work?

lib/environment.js contains the createEnvironment function which creates a new environment with the Lobby object and the tu function.
lib/receiver.js contains the Receiver main object (called Object in Io), as well as the definition of the Lobby object.
lib/primitives.js have some low level implementation of javascript primitives (like Number, String, Array, etc.) to get things rolling.
lib/message.js is where the magic happens. It contains the Message object which is used to represent the entirety of a Tu program. The special function here is evalMessage that takes a Message and an start interpreting it in the given context.
lib/parser.js is a Ohm grammar that parses a Tu program into a Message.

Check out also some strip down, early versions of the project in the study folder. Those should be more readable and easier to understand.

Recently evalMessage was made async, so that it can await on each message allowing to write something like this:

fetch("https://jsonplaceholder.typicode.com/todos/1") json userId println

This works and I must say it's rather cool. Unfortunately it made the interpreter much slower.

Where to go from here?

My ideas for this project would be:

Complete the implementation of evalMessage to properly support all the features of Io (in particular the stopStatus to allow for break, continue).
Attempt a DOM library to allow for DOM manipulation in the browser. See how it would feel to write a web app in Tu. Possibly integrate with Svelte to write something like (pseudo code):
```
<script lang="tu">
  name := "World"
  greeting := "Hello "..name.."!"
</script>
<div>
  <input type="text" bind:value={name} />
  <p>{greeting}</p>
</div>
```
Compile Tu into Javascript. This has some early attempts in study/try4 and it seams promising. Compiled Tu would not need to maintain the dynamic nature of Tu and it could be much more performant.

Not sure if and when I'll ever get to do any of those things :P

Published

Vulnerabilities

Links

Maintainers

Keywords

Readme