Building

To build the Lily interpreter, you will need the following:

  • CMake at version 3.0 or higher.

  • A C compiler that supports C11. Most any modern C compiler will work.

After cloning Lily and entering the directory, execute the following.

cmake .
cmake --build .

The above two commands work on all platforms. On some platforms, you may also be able to use make install to install Lily.

Successfully building Lily results in a lily executable in the toplevel directory.

Modes

The interpreter has three ways of reading content.

Code mode is the default. In code mode, all content is read as code and executed on success. Lily tags are a syntax error in this mode.

In template mode, code is between <?lily ... ?> tags, and content outside of those tags is rendered. Additionally, it is a syntax error if the file does not begin with a Lily tag, even if the tag is empty. This restriction exists to prevent template mode from accidentally "rendering" a code file.

Imports done from a template always import in code mode, allowing templates and code files to share code.

The third mode is manifest mode. Manifest mode is used to specify symbols that a C library will export. More information is available in the bindgen section. Reading through the tutorial beforehand is highly recommended.

Usage

Create a file named hello.lily and write the following.

print("Hello, world!")

Execute the script with lily hello.lily. You should see the message on your console.

The interpreter can also be invoked from the console as follows:

lily -s 'print("Hello, world!")`

By default, Lily reads scripts in code mode. The interpreter also supports a template mode that is available using -t.

Create a file named template.lily and write the following.

<?lily ?>
<html>
    <body>
        <?lily print("<p>Hello World</p>") ?>
    </body>
</html>

Execute the script with lily -t template.lily. You should see the content between <?lily ... ?> tags rendered.