Mesche Compiler

Mesche is a programming language that is designed for integration in C applications.

It is used as a high-performance scripting language to drive C applications and enable interactive development of program behavior. The compiler and runtime can be compiled directly into the C application so that this interactivity is available even in shipped applications.

Principles

• Simple: The compiler and runtime should be easy to understand and debug.
• Extensible: The language will be extensible through macros, Mesche modules, and easy registration of C functions into the runtime.
• Practical: Provides tools to build C/C++ projects that use Mesche (`mesche build`) and also manage project dependencies, especially those containing Mesche modules.

Use cases

• Developing hackable tools for creative work (video and music production, writing, task management)
• Game development with the Substratic Engine
• Mobile application development (in the future)

Should I use this?

Probably not, this project is highly experimental and will probably change frequently. However, if you find the idea interesting and would like to try it, I would certainly be happy to have your feedback!

Features

• Compiles directly to bytecode running on a custom VM
• First-class functions with closures
• First-class delimited continuations via reset and shift
• Tail-call optimization for recursive algorithms and loops
• Modules can be defined and loaded into Mesche projects
• Record types with fast setter and accessor functions
• Native function registration for integrating with C APIs
• Supports running a VM per OS thread (theoretically, but not tested)
• Cross-platform build orchestration, dependency management, and release builds with mesche build and mesche cli: https://github.com/mesche-lang/cli

Future Features

• A set of persistent data structures a la Clojure
• Support for Windows, macOS, and Android
• Hygenic macro definitions following Scheme’s design
• Authoring C API bindings directly in Mesche code to generate C wrappers
• APIs for working with dynamic arrays of C structures

License

This project is licensed under the BSD 3-Clause License.