Nikki

First implementation of a LISP-like asm layer for nara.

Plan

To have a series of LISPs bootstraping themselves up

Nikki0

A handwritten binary file that does only this from the input file:

• ignore whitespace
• lexes a number - parses it - writes it back as a u8
• any other byte it just writes it

The minimal way to have some sort of "human readable" assembly

Nikki1

The same as nikki0, written in nikki0 & with this:

• Comment support: from ; until LF or EOF

Nikki2

Nikki1 is LISP, but now includes conveniences for constants & functions:

• (defmod <module-name> <major> <minor>): declares the module.

• (def <name> <constant>): generates a constant in the constant table, where <constant> is:

  • (u64 <value>)
  • (string {[value]}): value may be a raw string or a number (interpreted as u8)
  • (function <module> <name>): a function constant. module and name are string literals.

• (defn <name> ...): creates a function with the name. All its following values are treated as nikki0 values. :

Nikki1 generates Nikki0 files, so those have to go through to reach a executable vmfile.

Nikki3

Same thing, now with more conveniences:

• (call <function-name> (...refs) (...values)): calls function-name with ref & value arguments, by copying those to their needed registers

• (let [...bindings] ...instructions): assigns a name to a reference/value register, like:

(let [name rf1
      age rv1]
  25 name age 0)  ; under the scope, `name` is replaced by `rf1` and so on

• (if <bool> ...): Easier conditional on the eyes. Still have to compute the condition outside
• (ifnot <bool> ...)

.eq rv5 rv0 rv1
(if rv5
  do stuff
  do more stuff)

->

.eq rv5 rv0 rv1
.jz rv5 :label-cont
do stuff
do more stuff
:label-cont