
Little is a statically typed, C-like scripting language - luckydude
http://www.little-lang.org/
======
luckydude
We've been using this language internally for a number of years and finally
got around to pushing it out the door.

It's unusual because it keeps C's types, so you get compile time type checking
(with some run time checks). In particular you get structs which are nicer
than the typical scripting language approach of using a hash where you want a
struct. The structs tend to be commented, I learn a lot about a program by
reading the struct declarations.

It's based on Tcl which might seem a little strange these days, but back in
the day we were a self funded startup (18 years later, still no VC money) and
there was just no way I could have paid for native guis on all the platforms.
So the Tk part of Tcl/Tk was essential. I love what Tk can do, even today. But
Tcl syntax drives me crazy unless I'm living in it every day.

Little has been pleasant to use, ctags just work, indent just works (until it
hits "if (buf =~ /regexp/)", I think that trips it up because it doesn't know
that // is like ""), c mode in editors tend to just work.

If it gains any traction I could imagine that someone tries to make a gcc
--little dialect, I'd be all over that idea.

It's been fun developing the language, here's hoping someone has fun using it.

------
isxek
_While some of us could switch from C to Tcl easily, our pointy-haired boss
could not, he 's mostly C and would lose about a half a day to get back into
Tcl._

 _He did what every crazy boss does, he funded a programming language._

These bits made me laugh (and feel some small amount of envy). Is it correct
to presume they're referring to you here?

~~~
luckydude
Hi, pointed haired boss here, reporting for duty :)

I get the envy, it is nice being able to fund a language. I feel vaguely
guilty like I was scratching my own itch, because that's exactly what was
going on. I'll feel less guilty if someone else says "hey, cool, looks like C"
and plays with it.

I think if I did it all over again I'd open source it sooner.

~~~
isxek
The envy is actually directed at your co-workers/employees: they get to work
on something that has almost completely no hope of becoming commercial :).

I understand why you did it with your VCS, but with a scripting language? I
would have made it open source sooner, too. Then again, as the business owner,
there are always other angles that need to be considered.

~~~
luckydude
It was just always work to clean it up and make a website and export the code
to git. It was everyone working on it for the last few weeks, it was way more
work than I wanted it to be.

The other aspect was that I wanted the language design to settle down before
open sourcing it. I wasn't interested in a "design by internet" language, my
experience is that stuff that comes out of one mind tends to hang together
better. I probably waited longer than I needed to :)

~~~
isxek
Thanks for open sourcing it! I'll start building syntax highlighting for it
for the editor I use. Should be easy enough since it's based on C.

