Quick start

This assumes hcc --version works. If it doesn't, see Installation.

Hello world

Make a file called hello.HC:

U0 Main()
{
  "Hello from HolyC!\n";
}

A string literal on its own line is a print statement. That's standard HolyC, not a hcc extension.

There are two ways to run it:

hcc hello.HC -o hello && ./hello   # compile ahead of time to a native binary
hcc -jit hello.HC                  # compile in memory and run immediately

Use -jit while you iterate and -o when you want a binary to keep or share. Both start at Main.

The REPL

hcc -repl

Definitions accumulate as you type, and statements run immediately. Typing these two lines prints 144:

I64 Square(I64 x) { return x * x; }
"%d\n", Square(12);

Put helpers you always want in ~/.hcc_rc.HC. It's loaded when the REPL starts.

Draw something without a window

The draw-basic example writes an image file using nothing but HolyC:

cd examples/draw-basic
hcc -jit draw.HC

It saves draw.ppm in the current directory. Most image viewers open PPM files. To convert one to PNG: magick draw.ppm draw.png (ImageMagick) or ffmpeg -i draw.ppm draw.png.

Open a window

cd examples/sprite-demo
hcc -jit sprite.HC

Arrow keys or W A S D move the character. Collect gems, avoid bats, click to release more bats, and press Esc to quit.

The sprite demo needs SDL2. The #link <SDL2> line in examples/common/sdl2.HC tells hcc to link it, so you don't pass any flags. Under -jit, hcc loads the library with dlopen instead.

Build everything

From the repo root:

./scripts/build-linux.sh       # macOS: ./scripts/build-macos.sh
ls build/bin

Run window programs from their own example folder, or from anywhere, since none of them load files at runtime:

./build/bin/cube
./build/bin/opengl_example

Your own project

Copy an example folder and examples/common/ next to each other, and keep the relative #include paths. See Project layout for how to grow it from there.