mcanthony/modulo

Modular C code generator

Modulo

Modulo is a tool that generates modular, standard C interfaces based on a high-level description language. The idea is to specify functionality in the module language and implement it in any language that supports C-style calling conventions.

This package include generators for C, JavaScript, Haskell and Common Lisp.

Requirements

• Haskell Platform
• Prettify

Installation

cabal configure
cabal install

Usage

Usage: modulo [options]
Usage: modulo [options] files...

Languages:
  C
  Lisp
  JavaScript
  Haskell

Options:
  -h        --help                Print help and exit
  -v        --version             Print version and exit
  -L[LANG]  --language[=LANG]     Output language
  -M[PATH]  --module-path[=PATH]  Module paths

Module language

Overview

Pointer       a*
Array         [a x N]
Function      (a, b) -> c
Struct        struct { a: A, b: B }
Union         union { a: A, b: B }
Tagged union  data { a: A, b: B }
Enum          enum { a, b, c }
Alias         b 

Description

The module language is very simple. Each module consists of a name followed by eventual import declarations, followed by all other declarations. Here is an example module:

module List
{
opaque Elem;
opaque List;

nil     : () -> List;
cons    : (Elem, List) -> List;
head    : (List) -> Elem;
tail    : (List) -> List;

empty   : (List) -> Bool;
lenght  : (List) -> Int;

reverse : (List) -> List;
sort    : (List) -> List;
}

Like C, the module language uses structural typing for pointers and functions, but nominal typing for structures and unions. Thus in the following example values of type A and B are interchangeable, but values of type C and D are not.

type A = Int*
type B = Int*
type C = struct { x : Int, y : Int }
type D = struct { x : Int, y : Int }

The pointer type constructor can be used with any type:

type IntPtr = Int*
type FloatPtr = Float*

The array type constructor need an explicit length:

type IntVec = [Int x 10]

Functions are written as in Haskell, except for the parentheses enclosing the arguments. Thus, higher-arity functions are easily distinguished.

type NoCurry = (A, B) -> C
type Curry   = (A) -> (B) -> C

Compound types are written in a uniform manner:

type IntCounter = struct { a : Int, b : Int -> Int }
type NumValue   = union { left : Int, right : Float }
type Color      = enum { Red, Green, Blue }

The following primitive types are provided:

Void Size Ptrdiff Intptr UIntptr 
Char Short Int Long LongLong
UChar UShort UInt ULong ULongLong
Float Double LongDouble
Int8 Int16 Int32 Int64 UInt8 UInt16 UInt32 UInt64