+TITLE: ob-zig.el - Org Babel bindings for the Zig programming language

• Introduction ob-zig.el provides [[https://orgmode.org/worg/org-contrib/babel/intro.html][Org Babel]] support for the [[https://ziglang.org][Zig]] programming language. Org Babel allows you to interactively edit and execute source code for many different languages in the same document.

This implementation mostly follows ob-C.el, which provides org-babel support for the C/C++/D languages.

• Prerequisites
  • A recent zig compiler that is installed on the exec PATH. [[https://ziglang.org/download/][Download Zig]].
  • org-mode/org-babel - these packages come installed with most recent emacs.

It is also nice to have zig-mode installed for working with zig source:

• zig-mode.el [[https://github.com/ziglang/zig-mode][Download zig-mode]]
  • Installation

    +begin_src shell

    git clone https://github.com/jolby/ob-zig.el.git

    +end_src

+begin_src emacs-lisp

(add-to-list 'load-path "/home/path-to-where-you-checked-out-ob-zig/")

+end_src

At this point, you should be able to interactively execute zig source blocks in org mode documents.

• Usage See the file ob-zig-test.org for examples of zig code blocks. If you place your cursor within the code blocks you can compile and execute using the key chord: =C-c C-c= You can also view the expanded source code block with the key chord: =C-c C-v C-v=

Here is an example of a zig code block within an org-mode document:

+begin_src org

,#+source: simple ,#+begin_src zig :imports '(std) const stdout = std.io.getStdOut().writer(); try stdout.print("{s}", .{"hello"}); ,#+end_src

+end_src

If you place the cursor somewhere within the above code block, and then press the key chord: =C-c C-c=, emacs will execute that zig source code and insert the result below:

+RESULTS: simple

: hello

Read the documentation of Org Babel for more examples of what you can do with source code blocks of many different languages.

• Testing ob-zig.el has a test suite that works with the [[https://www.gnu.org/software/emacs/manual/html_node/ert/index.html][ERT (Emacs Lisp Regression Testing)]] and org-test framework that comes with emacs. The directory containing org-test.el needs to be on the load path. In most cases this will be the "testing" directory under the root of the main org package on your system. On my doom-emacs setup, I needed to do this to get org-test on the load path:

+begin_src elisp

(add-to-list 'load-path (expand-file-name "straight/repos/org/testing" doom-local-dir))

+end_src

The file test-ob-zig-runner.el has some utility functions for setting up paths and running the ERT test suite. It should be sufficient to load that file and then call the interactive function: =M-x test-ob-zig-run-tests=.