Lisp-in-Charm VS Crafting Interpreters

This explanation of how to do it in Python is useful. I used it as a model for doing a Lisp in Charm, though there are differences of detail in the implementation.

I linked to an example of Lisp implemented in Charm. (Compare to Peter Norvig's Lisp implemented in Python, which goes about it a slightly different way but implements the exact same features.)

Here's my own Lisp, in my language. I wonder how many of us have done this.

Then to celebrate I used the strings library to make my implementation of Lisp in Charm shorter: it weighs in at 123 sloc now I don't have to roll my own string functions.

I have dogfooded it by usng it to implement other languages, a Forth, a Z80 emulator, and most recently a Lisp, to prove that it has chops as a GPL.

More dogfooding! Having done all that work to make Charm more useable, I wanted to use some darn Charm. It's pretty nice to code in now, this was not hard to do. Here's the listing.

Build an Interpreter (Chapter 14 on is written in C)

I’m guessing you’ll have to work with the scopes in the resolver:

https://github.com/munificent/craftinginterpreters/blob/mast...

Better open an issue/request wiki edit at https://github.com/munificent/craftinginterpreters/wiki/Lox-implementations

I'm late to the party, but I want to say thank you for sharing this. It's inspiring to look at how much you've built and (hopefully) enjoyed the process of building! I'm loving everything -- your site, your language design, your docs, your builtin libraries, your dev tools. Beyond impressive. People like you are the ones who make HN one of my best places on the internet.

For context on where I'm coming from, about two weeks ago I picked up Crafting Interpreters [1] for fun. I'm finding your clear-yet-concise Compiler internals [2] to be particularly compelling reading, and jumping back and forth between those "how this all works" docs and the live example of this language you actually built do a WASM-compiled tree-blowing-in-the-wind animation is just... just wow. So freaking cool!

I also enjoyed reading the comment thread that inspired you to start on Yaksha and seeing how this project has a wholesome start as inspiration-by-programming-hero. I hope you recognize that a few years later you've now ascended from inspiree to inspirer. I also hope you're still having tons of fun building out Yaksha!

[1] https://www.craftinginterpreters.com/

[2] https://yakshalang.github.io/documentation.html#compiler-int...

There are books which will talk you through the process. Crafting Interpreters is highly spoken of; I used Writing an Interpreter in Go, because I like Go. Then there's Compilers: Principles, Techniques, and Tools (the "Dragon Book"). This is considered heavy, but a classic, it's been around since '86.

I cannot recommend Crafting Interpreters by Robert Nystrom enough, it covers a lot of the stuff you need to know, completely for free.

Crafting Interpreters is a fun primer on language design. It has a complete roadmap to build a fairly simple language, twice. There are some topics it won't touch on, like static type systems, but it provides a great introduction so that you can start tinkering and learn by doing.