AVSL (A Very {Simple|Small|Safe} Language) in a nutshell

avsl-nutshell.txt

Goals:
  Easy to learn and use by beginning programmers
  Easy to relearn and use by "perpetual intermediate" programmers
  Suitable for use as a front-end language (not in a browser)
  Not infuriating to advanced programmers modulo syntax
    Support a "professional" syntax
  Case insensitive (except strings)
  Everything should be as simple as possible but no simpler
  
High-level design choices:
  Mostly intended for easy UI programming
    Supports both GUI/TUI and CLI users, probably with different clients
  Simple imperative language (neither OO nor FP)
  Dynamically typed
  Numbers are not exact or inexact, operators are
  Python-style indentation
 
Influences:
  ABC (the ancestor of Python)
  PROMAL (language for Apple II and Commodore C64)
  JSON
  
Types:
  Numbers (immutable)
  Dates (immutable) TBD
  Texts (immutable)
  Truth values (immutable)
  Null (immutable)
  Lists (mutable)
  Dictionaries (mutable)
  
 Simple lexical syntax:
  Single-line commands
  Case insensitive
  Variables and keywords: start with a Unicode letter, then Unicode letters and digits
  Number formats: 123, 3/4 123.45, 0.1, 1.0, 3.2e10, 3.2e-10, 0.nan, 0.inf
  Date format: 2020-12-27T20:02:05+07:00 (or -07:00)
  Text (string) formats: "this", 'that', "nested ""quotes"" doubled", """quotes
    with newlines""" (because line-oriented language)
  Truth values: true, false
  Null value: null
  Dates: ISO 8601
  
Compound lexical syntax:
  Lists: [exp, ...) or []
  Sets: {expr,...}               ; notation for empty set is SET()
  Dictionaries: {entry:value, ...} or {}
  Subscripting: [expr] for selection, [expr:expr] for slicing lists or strings; return copies   
                also allowed where vars are
   
Commands for collections:
  ADD expr TO expr                  ; for sets
  ADD KEY expr VALUE expr TO expr   ; for dictionaries
  ADD expr TO expr AT expr          ; for lists
  REMOVE expr FROM expr             ; for sets and dictionaries
  REMOVE exper TO expr FROM expr    ; for lists
  
Block commands:
  IF expr:                       ; No else clause
  SELECT: expr1                  ; Execute block on first expr2 = expr1
    expr2:                       ; Default expr1 is true
    ...
  LOOP WHILE expr:               ; Execute block while expr is true
  LOOP var IN expr:              ; Loop over collections
  LOOP var FROM expr TO expr:    ; Loop over numeric range (inclusive)
  TRY:                           ; TBD
  
Input commands:
  TIE INPUT type -> var          ; Request input of the specified type
                                 ; to be put in var (now in CLI, linkage set up in GUI)
  TIE CHOICE set-expr -> var     ; Similar, but user picks one element of the set
  TIE CHOICES set-expr -> var    ; Similar, but user picks one or more elements of the set
  WAIT text-expr                 ; Display text-expr to user (possibly as a button)
                                 ; and suspend execution until the user responds
                                 ; Note: tied variables are frozen after this
  WAIT IMAGE url-expr            ; Same idea, but image is fetched from URL
  
HTTP commands:
  GET url-expr -> var STATUS var
  PUT expr -> url-expr STATUS var
  POST|PATCH expr TO url-expr -> var STATUS var
  REMOVE url-expr STATUS var 
  Results become an image, a list of strings, or an arbitrary object when JSON, or ???
  
Assignment and binding:
  PUT expr -> var                ; Assign to mutable variable
  LET var BE expr                ; Bind variables to immutable variable
  LET var, ... BE expr, ...      ; Bind variables to immutable variables from series

Miscellaneous commands:
  DO NOTHING
  SHARE var, ...                 ; Declare a global variable (globally or locally)
  CHECK bool-expr                ; Program aborts if expr is false
  SHOW expr, ...                 ; Output values of expressions
  SHOW expr, ... ,               ; Final comma suppresses newline
  SHOW LINK url TEXT string      ; Display a link
  DEBUG PRINT expr, ...          ; Sent to the console window
  SHOW IMAGE url-expr            ; Fetch image from URL and show it
  SET RANDOM                     ; Randomize the random number sequence
  DONE                           ; Terminate defined command or program
  RETURN expr                    ; Return value from an operator
  
Definitions:
  HOW TO keywords <var ...> ...  ; Multiple keywords allowed
   [ -> <var> ...]               ; Variable names are in explicit angle brackets
  OPERATION <var> keywords <var> ; Define a dyadic operation
  OPERATION keywords <var>       ; Define a monadic operator
    
Arithmetic operators:
  +, -, *, /                     ; Exact but sometimes slow
  .+, .-, .*, ./                 ; Fast but inexact
  ROOT expr                      ; square root
  expr1 ROOT expr2               ; expr1-th root
  - expr                         ; negation
  
Other numeric operators:
  ABS expr
  SIGN expr
  FLOOR expr, CEILING expr, ROUND expr
  expr1 MOD expr2
  NUMERATOR expr, DENOMINATOR expr
  RANDOM, RANDOM expr             ; random number from 0 to 1, random integer from 0 to expr
  MIN expr, MAX expr              ; minimum or maximum of list of numbers
  TBD: trig, exp, log
  
Text operators:
  LOWER expr, UPPER expr
  STRIP expr
  expr1 JOIN expr2                ; join list of texts in expr2 using expr1
  expr1 SPLIT expr2               ; split list of texts in expr2 using expr1 delimiter
  
Truth value operators:
  AND, OR, NOT

Date operators:
   TBD
 
Set operators
  SET ()                          ; return empty set
  
Conversion operators:
  Applying LIST to a list or DICTIONARY to a dictionary makes a copy.
  NUMBER expr                     ; converts text to number
  TEXT expr                       ; uses lexical-syntax representations of all other types
  DATE expr                       ; string to date, number??
  LIST expr                       ; converts text, dictionary
                                  ; dictionary becomes list of 2-element lists
  DICTIONARY expr                 ; converts list of 2-element lists
  
Generic operators:
  expr1 ++ expr2                  ; concatenate texts, lists, sets, dictionaries
                                  ; text can be concatenated with anything (?)
  LENGTH expr                     ; length of texts, lists, sets, dictionaries, series
  <, =, >, <=, >=, !=             ; compare texts, sets, numbers
  IN, NOT IN                      ; inclusion in texts, lists, sets, dictionaries
  CHOICE OF expr                     ; choose random item from list, set
  
  SQLite support?