Show HN: An Easy Programming Language That Runs in the Browser

[chkas]

What's under the hood?

The source code is parsed to an AST, which is then executed. It began with a Java-Applet. When WebAssembly appeared, I ported it to C++ with a JS/HTML interface and added graphics. Recently I converted the C++ part to C, which halved the size of the wasm file.

[soapdog]

Really liked that! Congratulations on your work, it is very inspiring. I am also trying to build small languages, for fun, I think the web could use more languages.

One example that is quite amazing in my opinion is Pyret, I think you might like it, check it out at https://www.pyret.org

[dvh]

I have a question for wasm, is it possible to temporary suspend the execution of wasm program and then continue execution, e.g. tomorrow?

[mbel]

> Recently I converted the C++ part to C, which halved the size of the wasm file.

So you are saying that "costless" abstractions of C++ actually had some cost? Who would have thought.

[nine_k]

The original Javascript was intended as an easy language that runs in the browser. And so it was in 1996.

In reality, it seems, a successful language that runs in the browser had no way around becoming a "full-blown" language, as opposed to "easy".

[bartread]

JavaScript still can be easy if you ignore the rest of the ecosystem.

Thing is, sooner or later, at the very least you find yourself wanting something like lodash or jQuery[1]. Ironically, the latter also came into existence to make programming across different browsers simpler back in the bad old days (of not that long ago), and did an admirable job of that.

Unfortunately jQuery, and similar libraries of the mid-noughties era, provided the breach in the dam that's seen us swamped in a torrent of new, sometimes baffling, and on occasion arguably unnecessary platforms, libraries, and tools, which have made the process of developing for the client a much more intimidating process for those starting out.

[1] Although these days you'd be surprised by how much of what jQuery offered is now built into the browser APIs and works consistently across them.

[KennyCason]

I’m a huge fan of these sorts of simple programming languages. I consider the simplicity of Purebasic and TI-83/89 Basic to be one of the main reasons I was able to successfully get into programming in high school despite not having any programming classes. I was also simultaneously learning x86 ASM and while that was also super fun, my Basic programming was far ahead of my ASM. Being able to successfully build simple games in Basic is extremely motivating when learning to code.

[Aardwolf]

Nice! It would be more fitting for the style of this language if 'end' were used instead of '.' imho

[chkas]

`end` as block delimiter makes much noise. Python code looks clean because it only uses indentations to delimit blocks. But this makes it at least difficult to refactor the code and to reformat it automatically.

[Kaveren]

I think there's more value to be had in building better learning resources around programming languages than continually trying to simplify them at the expense of power.

Besides that, if someone is already looking for a simple scripting language, Lua already exists. I personally prefer its syntax as well.

[abenedic]

A person might make a language so they can learn to make a language. How could Lua exist if a person had no idea the tradeoffs in implementing various languages? You do not know the person's reasons.

[thrower123]

Lua really is a nice little language. I do wish it had 0-based arrays like everything else in common use though.

[tobyhinloopen]

Lua might have little features and have a small footprint, but it's not simple to understand

[ranit]

Reminds me of the old educational graphics programming language Logo.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Logo_(programming_language)

[xori]

I grew up with Turing, which was nice later in life because it resembled pseudo code pretty closely.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turing_(programming_language)

I think the best teaching language is one that can have a ball bouncing across the screen with as little ceremony as possible.

[VictorSCushman]

Really cool. Is there a project repository, and are you accepting contributions?

[chkas]

Not yet

[z92]

Great! Brings back the simplicity of Basic and QBasic. How easy it was to draw, animate and create music.

[abenedic]

The source is actually pretty readable, do you have a git repository anywhere so others can contribute?

[arayh]

Nice work! I would love it if we could get something like a codepen.io for this language, so we could share and debug code with people learning to program.

[vanderZwan]

Look under "More Features" of the main website[0][1].

> kabas.online can be opened passing a programm within an URL parameter

If the author of the language reads this: you could try shortening the URL with LZString[2].

[0] https://kabas.online/main.html

[1] https://kabas.online/run.html?title=Run&code=sz%20%3D%20100%....

[2] http://pieroxy.net/blog/pages/lz-string/index.html

[v01d4lph4]

Impressive! But why?

[chkas]

There are so many programming languages - but imho not a real easy one for beginners.

[onemoresoop]

Fantastic work. Hope it finds its niche and grows

[Micoloth]

Very cool, both the graphics capabilities and the fact that it's Wasm!

Is this project open source?

[RickJWagner]

Cool! Thanks for sharing.

[pmarreck]

There should be something like this except functional/immutable

[chkas]

Many design decisions are based on keeping the language simple in syntax and semantics.

[agumonkey]

much logo