HAXIAL


Haxial Compiler

Haxial Compiler is a product that provides a cross-platform network-focused software development environment with a powerful (but easy-to-use) compiled programming language named "KL". Haxial Compiler is intended for use by software engineers/developers, and also people interested in learning how to make their own software, and people interested in automation tasks and scripting.

Haxial Compiler provides a superior replacement for the C and C++ programming languages. Programs written in the Haxial programming language ("KL") can be compiled to fully native code programs and can achieve the same speed/performance as C/C++ programs, but with much less time and effort required to write the program, less source code, and with better reliability and security.

Programming in the C or C++ languages can be very tedious, frustrating, and unenjoyable. Haxial Compiler eliminates much of the tedious activity, allowing you to focus on the fun parts, and be more productive. For the experienced software engineer, Haxial Compiler makes software engineering fun again. However Haxial Compiler is certainly not a toy — it is very much intended for practical-minded serious real-world software development.

In C++, it is easy to make mistakes that are difficult to find, and easy to make an unreliable or insecure program. In C++, even basic operations require large amounts of code to be written. C++ focuses too much on obscure and abstract features and not enough on being practical and productive in the real world. Haxial Compiler delivers much improved reliability, security, and productivity compared to C++.

Please send us your complaints and criticisms of Haxial Compiler, so that we can listen to your feedback, incorporate it, and make Haxial Compiler better as a result. We know that some people will inevitably find deficiencies and things to dislike in Haxial Compiler, and we want you to tell us about any problems so we can fix them.

When criticising Haxial Compiler, please be sure to include an explanation of your REASONS. There is no point just saying "It sucks!" without explaining why. People cannot read your mind. If a person says "It sucks!" without stating any reasons, then they are being immature and unprofessional. Children say "It sucks!", whereas mature adults and professionals say "I dislike the way it does blah blah because of the following reasons".

For a detailed description of the Haxial programming language (KL), please see the documentation.

To view an example of KL source code, download this KL source code file or view this screenshot or another screenshot. The example program does not do anything useful, it just demonstrates various things. Please note that Haxial is aware of a few unpleasant aspects of the example, and is currently fixing those problems. Please also note that if you dislike the syntax, some alternate syntax forms are also supported.

To be notified via e-mail when new versions of Haxial Compiler are released, please subscribe to the announcement mailing list.

Current Status

Beta versions have been released for testing (you can download it below). Beta meaning that it is unfinished, missing some features, contains bugs, and may malfunction.

New versions are being released every 1-4 weeks on average.

Apologies to Mac and Linux users -- unfortunately only the MSWin version has been released so far. The Mac and Linux versions are not quite working yet, they need some more work. But rest assured that full support for Mac and Linux is in progress. Mac and Linux users are important to us.

Documentation is available below. The documentation is extensive but not yet finished.

Discussion Mailing List

To discuss Haxial Compiler or seek assistance, you can join the Haxial Software Engineering Discussion mailing list. The mailing list is for software engineers and people interested in learning how to make their own software using Haxial Compiler, and the discussion is of a technical nature (it is OK if you are new to software development, provided you are willing to learn).

You can join/subscribe on this webpage:
      lists.haxial.com/listinfo.cgi/hsediscuss-haxial.com
(That is not a clickable link because we don't want spam robots following it. Copy & paste into address bar instead.)

After you have subscribed, you can send a message to everyone on the mailing list by sending an email to:
      hsediscuss at lists dot haxial dot com

To prevent the mailing list from cluttering your inbox with messages, setup a mail filter/rule that automatically moves every incoming message containing "[hsediscuss]" in the subject line into a folder in your mailbox or mail client that you have created for this mailing list. Alternatively, the mailing list has a digest option. If you enable the digest option, it will collect multiple messages into 1 email that it sends daily.

NOTE: If you do not receive any messages from the mailing list, check whether you have a spam filter that is blocking the messages. You might need to add the following to your whitelist:
      lists dot haxial dot com
      hsediscuss at lists dot haxial dot com
      hsediscuss-bounces at lists dot haxial dot com

Also, you might be interested in the Bribes system. Note that you may be able to implement some of the listed bribes yourself and collect the money for them (if you are approved).

Download Software

WARNING:
This software is a BETA version for testing purposes only. That means it is unfinished, and might malfunction or be difficult to use. Please post bug reports to the discussion mailing list.

Instructions

  1. Download and install the free MS Windows SDK. Haxial Compiler requires it. Alternatively MS Visual Studio 2008 is also accepted. Using the "web install" option is probably faster but downloading and burning the DVD image allows you to reinstall later even if microsoft.com stops supplying it.
  2. Download the zipped Haxial Compiler archive. Unzip the archive.
  3. Open the "Command Prompt" item included in the archive.
  4. Type the following command and press Enter:
    HaxialCompiler.exe "ExampleProgram.kl" CfgFC
  5. Note when typing file names or paths into the Command Prompt, you can hit the tab key to auto-complete the names. You can also drag & drop files into the Command Prompt window to paste their full path. Also the up-arrow key retrieves previous commands.
  6. Haxial Compiler reads the text file "ExampleProgram.kl" containing an example program written in the Haxial programming language, and compiles it to an executable ".exe" program file in the "hc-output" folder.
  7. Run the newly created ".exe" program by double-clicking it. You can see the results of the program.
  8. Close the example program.
  9. Open the "ExampleProgram.kl" file in a text editor of your choice (it is a plain text file).
  10. Try making a modification to the source code in "ExampleProgram.kl".
  11. Save changes to the "ExampleProgram.kl" file.
  12. Close the "ExampleProgram.kl" file if necessary (probably not necessary).
  13. Run Haxial Compiler again. Hopefully no error messages appear.
  14. Run the created ".exe" program again to see the results of your change.

Text Editors

The following text editor programs can be used to edit KL source code in text files.