Zig (programming language)
Zig is an imperative, general-purpose, statically typed, compiled system programming language designed by Andrew Kelley.[3][4] The language is designed for "robustness, optimality and maintainability"[5] [6] , supporting compile-time generics and reflection, cross-compilation and manual memory management.[7] A major goal of the language is to compete with (and improve upon) C,[8][9] while also taking inspiration from Rust,[10][11] among others.
Paradigms | Multi-paradigm: imperative, concurrent, procedural, functional |
---|---|
Designed by | Andrew Kelley |
Developer | Andrew Kelley, Open source |
First appeared | 8 February 2016[1] |
Preview release | 0.7.1
/ 13 December 2020[2] |
Typing discipline | Static, Strong, Inferred, Structural, Generic |
Platform | x86 64, ARM, MIPS, x86, WebAssembly, RISC-V |
OS | Cross-platform |
License | MIT License |
Filename extensions | .zig, .zir |
Website | ziglang |
Influenced by | |
C, C++, LLVM IR, Go, Rust, JavaScript |
Zig has many features for low level programming, notably: packed structs (structs with zero padding between fields), arbitrary width integers[12] and multiple pointer types.[13]
The compiler is written in Zig and C++, using LLVM 11[14] as a back-end,[15][16] supporting many of its native targets.[17] The compiler is free and open source software under the MIT License.[18] The Zig compiler exposes the ability to compile C and C++, similar to Clang by using the command "zig cc" and "zig c++", respectively.[19] The Nim programming language supports the use of zig cc
as a C compiler.[20]
Examples
Hello World
const std = @import("std");
pub fn main() !void {
const stdout = std.io.getStdOut().writer();
try stdout.print("Hello, {}!\n", .{"world"});
}
Generic linked list
pub fn main() void {
var node = LinkedList(i32).Node {
.prev = null,
.next = null,
.data = 1234,
};
var list = LinkedList(i32) {
.first = &node,
.last = &node,
.len = 1,
};
}
fn LinkedList(comptime T: type) type {
return struct {
pub const Node = struct {
prev: ?*Node,
next: ?*Node,
data: T,
};
first: ?*Node,
last: ?*Node,
len: usize,
};
}
References
- Kelley, Andrew. "Introduction to the Zig Programming Language". andrewkelley.me. Retrieved 8 November 2020.
- https://github.com/ziglang/zig/releases
- "Zig has all the elegant simplicity of C, minus all the ways to shoot yourself in the foot". JAXenter. 2017-10-31. Retrieved 2020-02-11.
- "Tired of C? New programming language Zig aims to be more pragmatic and readable". 2017-10-19. Retrieved 2020-04-22.
- Yegulalp, Serdar (2016-08-29). "New challenger joins Rust to topple C language". InfoWorld. Retrieved 2020-02-11.
- "Zig language and C". Sina Corp. 2020-07-12. Retrieved 2020-08-12.
- "The Zig Programming Language". ziglang.org. Retrieved 2020-02-11.
- "Mozilla's Observatory, the Zig programming language, and uSens' VR/AR SDK—SD Times news digest: Aug. 29, 2016". SD Times. 2016-08-29. Retrieved 2020-02-11.
- "The Zig Programming Language". ziglang.org. Retrieved 2020-02-11.
- Company, Sudo Null. "Sudo Null - IT News for you". SudoNull. Retrieved 2020-02-11.
- Kelley, Andrew. "Unsafe Zig is Safer Than Unsafe Rust". andrewkelley.me. Retrieved 2020-02-11.
- Tim Anderson 24 Apr 2020 at 09:50. "Keen to go _ExtInt? LLVM Clang compiler adds support for custom width integers". www.theregister.co.uk. Retrieved 2020-04-24.
- "Documentation - The Zig Programming Language". ziglang.org. Retrieved 2020-04-24.
- "SD Times news digest: C++20 concepts in Visual Studio 2010 version 16.3, Bootstrap to drop IE support, and Zig 0.60 released". SD Times. 2020-04-14. Retrieved 2020-04-19.
- "A Reply to _The Road to Zig 1.0_". www.gingerbill.org. 2019-05-13. Retrieved 2020-02-11.
- ziglang/zig, Zig Programming Language, 2020-02-11, retrieved 2020-02-11
- "The Zig Programming Language". ziglang.org. Retrieved 2020-02-11.
- "ziglang/zig". GitHub. Retrieved 2020-02-11.
- "0.6.0 Release Notes · The Zig Programming Language". ziglang.org. Retrieved 2020-04-19.
- "Add support for 'zig cc' as C compiler. by hessammehr · Pull Request #13757 · nim-lang/Nim". GitHub. Retrieved 2020-04-19.