Literals

Literals are ephemeral expressions that allow expressing a fixed value directly.

Integer Literals

Integer literals are expressions that represent an unsigned integral value. They are fluid and thus not explicitly typed, but they may only convert to integral types. They are represented as one of the following:

• 0
• non-zero decimal digit (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9) followed by 0 or more decimal digits (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9)
• 0b followed by 1 or more binary digits (0, 1)
• 0o followed by 1 or more octal digits (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7)
• 0x followed by 1 or more hexadecimal digits (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, a, A, b, B, c, C, d, D, e, E, f, F)

An integer literal may optionally have a suffix of scientific notation which is: an E or an e, followed by an optional + or - (omitting is equivalent to +), followed by 1 or more decimal digits (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9).

Integer literals may optionally be broken up by underscores ( _ ) anywhere except for the beginning. This means that 12_345_ is equivalent to 12345.

Float Literals

Float literals are expressions that represent an unsigned floating value. They are fluid and thus not explicitly typed, but they may only convert to floating types. They are represented by one of the following:

• 1 or more decimal digits (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9), followed by followed a period (.), followed by 1 or more decimal digits (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9). This may optionally be have suffix of scientific notation which is: an E or an e, followed by an optional + or - (omitting is equivalent to +), followed by 1 or more decimal digits (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9).
• 0x, followed by 1 or more hexadecimal digits (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, a, A, b, B, c, C, d, D, e, E, f, F), followed by a period (.), followed by 1 or more hexadecimal digits (0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, a, A, b, B, c, C, d, D, e, E, f, F)

Float literals may optionally be broken up by underscores ( _ ) anywhere except for the beginning. This means that 1_234.5 is equivalent to 1234.5.

Boolean Literals

Boolean literals are expressions represent a single boolean value. They are type Bool and are represented by the following:

• true
• false

Character Literals

Character literals are expressions that represent a single character and are represented as ASCII. They are type Char. They are represented by two single-quote characters (') containing one the following:

• Any basic ASCII printable character excluding ', \, new-line, or carriage return
• A character escape code

String Literals

String literals are expressions that represent a string of text. They are type [Char:N;'\0'] where N is the number of characters in the string literal. They are represented by two double-quotes characters (") containing 0 or more of the following:

• Any basic ASCII printable character excluding ", and \
• A character escape code

Notes

As suggested by the type, string literals automatically have a null-terminator appended. This means that "\0" is represented in memory as two null-terminator.

Unlike languages like C/C++ and Zig, nothing special needs to be done to allow string literals to be multi-line.

Examples

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// integer literals
def INTEGER: Int = 12;
def SCIENTIFIC_INTEGER: USize = 14e2; // 1400
def BINARY_FLUID_INTEGER = 0b11010; // 26

// float literals
def FLOAT: F32 = 12.4;

// boolean literals
def BOOL: Bool = true;

// character literals
def CHARACTER: Char = 'a';
def NULL_TERMINATOR: Char = '\0';

// string literals literals
def STRING_LITERAL: [Char:28;'\0'] = "Hello, I am a string literal";
def MULTI_LINE_STRING_LITERAL: [Char:38;'\0'] = "Hello, I 
am a
	multi-line\n string 
literal";