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Getting started

Install​

Homebrew (macOS + Linux)​

brew install code-by-sia/xi/xi
brew upgrade xi        # later, to update

Tarball (any supported platform)​

Download the toolchain for your platform from the releases page, unpack it, and put its bin/ on your PATH:

# grab the asset for your platform, e.g. xi-<version>-macos-arm64.tar.gz
tar -xzf xi-<version>-<os>-<arch>.tar.gz
export PATH="$PWD/xi-<version>-<os>-<arch>/bin:$PATH"

Either way you get two commands — xc (compiler) and xi (run tool + REPL). Tarball installs upgrade in place with xi update; Homebrew installs upgrade with brew upgrade xi.

Requirements: a C compiler (cc — clang or gcc) on your PATH, since xc produces a native binary by compiling generated C. Supported platforms: Linux (x86_64, arm64) and macOS (arm64, x86_64).

Windows​

No native Windows build yet (the runtime uses POSIX APIs). Use WSL2 (install a Linux distro and follow the Linux steps), or Docker:

docker build -t xi .   # from a clone of the repo
docker run --rm -v "${PWD}:/work" xi xi hello.xi   # compile + run
docker run --rm -it -v "${PWD}:/work" xi xi        # REPL

Hello, world​

hello.xi
import "std/log.xi"

async entry (logger: Logger) main(args: String[]) {
    logger.info("Hello World!")
}

module App {}

(logger: Logger) on the entry asks for a Logger by interface; the compiler injects the standard ConsoleLogger — no globals, no setup. (Bind your own Logger later and main doesn't change.) See Dependency injection.

entry always returns Integer, so the -> Integer is optional and a body without a return exits 0 — write -> Integer and return <code> only when you want a non-zero exit code. (An unhandled interrupt that reaches main aborts with a non-zero status.)

Compile to a native binary, then run it:

$ xc hello.xi        # writes build/hello
$ ./build/hello
Hello World!

Or compile and run in one step with xi:

$ xi hello.xi
Hello World!

Try the REPL​

$ xi
Xi REPL — :help for commands, :quit to exit
x> let n = 21
x> print("double = " + n * 2)
double = 42
x> :quit

Next steps​

Building the compiler from source (it's self-hosting) is covered in Compiler internals and the repository README — you don't need that to write Xi.