The Knox Programming Language

Knox is an experimental language meant to help me learn Go and explore compiler design (NOTE: I don't work on this anymore.). It acts as a systems language with high-level constructs for convenience. The compiler is written in Go and generates C. It is very early in development.

The principles behind the design of Knox are:

• Explicitness. Explicit and unambiguous code is a priority, even over brevity. No surprises.
• Pass by reference. All complex types should be pass by reference and pointers should be hidden, like Java and C#.
• Small language. Simple and consistent syntax with few constructs, as an alternative to Zig or C.
• Convenient data structures. Strings, lists, and maps are first-class data structures that should be as easy as Python.
• Operability. Use any C library and produce C libraries.
• Easy to setup and use. No massive installation like C# or Java and no annoying configuration like Go's gopath.
• Fast enough. Compiling time, execution time, and memory usage should be comparable to directly using C.
• Low overhead. All runtime dependencies are optional for systems programming.
• Well-behaved. Contracts, error handling, and unit tests are first-class constructs.

func main() void {
    fizzbuzz(300);
}

func fizzbuzz(n : int) void {
    for i : int in stl.range(1,10,1) {
        if i%15 == 0 {
            stl.print("FizzBuzz");
        } else if i%3 == 0 {
            stl.print("Fizz");
        } else if i%5 == 0 {
            stl.print("Buzz");
        } else {
            stl.print(i);
        }
    }
}

Comparison to Go:

• Classes instead of structs
• Objects are pass-by-reference
• Ada-style type constraints
• No garbage collector
• No type inference
• No short form of variable declarations
• No variable declaration blocks
• No implicit casting
• Variables must be initialized
• Semicolons required
• Different syntax for variable and function declarations
• Python-style While and For loops
• Allows whitespace between if and elseif blocks
• Enum support
• Sum types
• Constructors
• Classes must explicitly implement interfaces
• No pointers
• All return values must be used or explicitly thrown away
• No goto
• Multiple assignment is only for multiple return values