The Cognate programming language

Cognate is a small dynamic quasi-concatenative language for functional programming. Cognate aims to express complex programs in a simple and readable way through its unique syntax, which emphasises embedding comments into statements. This makes programs very readable and helps a programmer better express their intentions.

Cognate is readable

Cognate's compiler ignores words beginning with lowercase letters, allowing comments and code to be interwoven. This 'informal syntax' being optional allows Cognate to be verbose where detail is needed and concise where it isn't.

Cognate is efficient

CognaC (the Cognate Compiler) compiles Cognate sources directly into C. This produces very small and rather fast binaries, allowing Cognate to outperform most dynamic languages. This also makes Cognate a candidate for scripting in embedded environments, such as microcontrollers.

Cognate is simple

Cognate has only a handful of syntax elements. This makes the language very consistent and easy to learn. In future this will allow me to elegantly introduce metaprogramming constructs.

Cognate is functional

Cognate is designed for functional programming - but does not require a PhD in discrete mathematics to use. While Cognate is oriented around first-class functions, no restrictions are placed on IO - making debugging and refactoring less headache-inducing.

Cognate is powerful

Cognate is a stack-oriented programming language. This means that all intermediary values reside in a stack data structure. This allows powerful features such as:

• Multiple return values
• Point-free functions
• Operation chaining

Building Cognate

Currently, Cognate will run on Linux and MacOS systems. If you use Windows, then you can install Cognate on the Windows Subsystem for Linux. To build Cognate, you will need make, flex, bison, and a C compiler (currently supported are GCC, Clang, and TCC). After installing these, simply run:

make

If that succeeds, install the compiler with:

make install

This installs cognate to the .local prefix. To install to a different directory:

make PREFIX=/my/prefix/dir install

You should then run the test script to test Cognate's functionality. This should work regardless of operating system.

make test -j

If the tests all pass (they should!), you can then try running some of the included demo programs:

cognac examples/fizzbuzz.cog
./examples/fizzbuzz

Here is an work-in-progress introduction to the language.