63 lines
2.8 KiB
Markdown
63 lines
2.8 KiB
Markdown
---
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layout: news
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author: Torsten
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---
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Ok, that was surprising: I just wrote a language in two months. Parser, compiler, working binaries
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and all.
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Then i [documented it](/typed/typed.html) , detailed the [syntax](/typed/syntax.html) and even did
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some [benchmarking](/typed/benchmarks.html). Speed is luckily roughly where i wanted it. Mostly
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(only mostly?) slower than c, but only by about 50, very understandable percent. It is doing
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things in a more roundabout, and easier to understand way, and lacking any optimisation. It means
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you can do about a million fibonacci(20) in a second on a pi, and beat ruby at it by a about
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a factor of 20.
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So, the good news: it **it works**
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Working means: calling works, if, while, assignment, class and method definition. The benchmarks
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were hello world and fibonacci, both recursive and by looping.
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I even updated the [**whole book**](/book.html) to be up to date. Added a Soml section, updated
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parfait, rewrote the register level . . .
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### It all clicked into place
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To be fair, i don't think anyone writes a language that isn't a toy in 2 months, and it was only
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possible because a lot of the stuff was there already.
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- [Parfait](/typed/parfait.html) was pretty much there. Just consolidated it as it is all just adapter.
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- The [Register abstraction](/typed/debugger.html) (bottom) was there.
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- Using the ast library made things easier.
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- A lot of the [parser](https://github.com/ruby-x/salama-reader) could be reused.
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And off course the second time around everything is easier (aka hindsight is perfect).
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One of the better movie lines comes to mind,
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([paraphrased](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1341188/quotes)) "We are all just one small
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adjustment away from making our code work". It was a step sideways in the head which brought a leap
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forward in terms of direction. Not where i was going but where i wanted to go.
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### Open issues
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Clearly i had wobbled on the parfait front. Now it's clear it will have to be recoded in soml,
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and then re-translated into ruby. But it was good to have it there in ruby all the time for the
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concepts to solidify.
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Typing is not completely done, and negative tests for types are non existant. Also exceptions and
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the machinery for the returns.
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I did a nice framework for testing the binaries on a remote machine, would be nice to have it
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on travis. But my image is over 2Gb.
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### And onto the next compiler
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The ideas about how to compile ruby into soml have been percolating and are waiting to be put to
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action. [The theory](http://book.salama-vm.org/object/dynamic_types.html) looks good,but one has
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to see it to believe it.
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The first steps are quite clear though. Get the [ruby parser](https://github.com/whitequark/parser)
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integrated, get the compiler up, start with small tests. Work the types at the same time.
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And let the adventure continue.
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