"Complexity" seems to be a lot like "energy": you can transfer it from the end user to one/some of the other players, but the total amount seems to remain pretty much constant for a given task. -- Ran
Note: This document is a draft! Several of Nim's features may need more precise wording. This manual is constantly evolving until the 1.0 release and is not to be considered as the final proper specification.
This document describes the lexis, the syntax, and the semantics of Nim.
The language constructs are explained using an extended BNF, in which (a)* means 0 or more a's, a+ means 1 or more a's, and (a)? means an optional a. Parentheses may be used to group elements.
& is the lookahead operator; &a means that an a is expected but not consumed. It will be consumed in the following rule.
The |, / symbols are used to mark alternatives and have the lowest precedence. / is the ordered choice that requires the parser to try the alternatives in the given order. / is often used to ensure the grammar is not ambiguous.
Non-terminals start with a lowercase letter, abstract terminal symbols are in UPPERCASE. Verbatim terminal symbols (including keywords) are quoted with '. An example:
ifStmt = 'if' expr ':' stmts ('elif' expr ':' stmts)* ('else' stmts)? The binary ^* operator is used as a shorthand for 0 or more occurrences separated by its second argument; likewise ^+ means 1 or more occurrences: a ^+ b is short for a (b a)* and a ^* b is short for (a (b a)*)?. Example:
arrayConstructor = '[' expr ^* ',' ']'
Other parts of Nim - like scoping rules or runtime semantics are only described in the, more easily comprehensible, informal manner for now.
A Nim program specifies a computation that acts on a memory consisting of components called locations. A variable is basically a name for a location. Each variable and location is of a certain type. The variable's type is called static type, the location's type is called dynamic type. If the static type is not the same as the dynamic type, it is a super-type or subtype of the dynamic type.
An identifier is a symbol declared as a name for a variable, type, procedure, etc. The region of the program over which a declaration applies is called the scope of the declaration. Scopes can be nested. The meaning of an identifier is determined by the smallest enclosing scope in which the identifier is declared unless overloading resolution rules suggest otherwise.
An expression specifies a computation that produces a value or location. Expressions that produce locations are called l-values. An l-value can denote either a location or the value the location contains, depending on the context. Expressions whose values can be determined statically are called constant expressions; they are never l-values.
A static error is an error that the implementation detects before program execution. Unless explicitly classified, an error is a static error.
A checked runtime error is an error that the implementation detects and reports at runtime. The method for reporting such errors is via raising exceptions or dying with a fatal error. However, the implementation provides a means to disable these runtime checks. See the section pragmas for details.
Whether a checked runtime error results in an exception or in a fatal error at runtime is implementation specific. Thus the following program is always invalid:
var a: array[0..1, char] let i = 5 try: a[i] = 'N' except IndexError: echo "invalid index"
An unchecked runtime error is an error that is not guaranteed to be detected, and can cause the subsequent behavior of the computation to be arbitrary. Unchecked runtime errors cannot occur if only safe language features are used.
All Nim source files are in the UTF-8 encoding (or its ASCII subset). Other encodings are not supported. Any of the standard platform line termination sequences can be used - the Unix form using ASCII LF (linefeed), the Windows form using the ASCII sequence CR LF (return followed by linefeed), or the old Macintosh form using the ASCII CR (return) character. All of these forms can be used equally, regardless of platform.
Nim's standard grammar describes an indentation sensitive language. This means that all the control structures are recognized by indentation. Indentation consists only of spaces; tabulators are not allowed.
The indentation handling is implemented as follows: The lexer annotates the following token with the preceding number of spaces; indentation is not a separate token. This trick allows parsing of Nim with only 1 token of lookahead.
The parser uses a stack of indentation levels: the stack consists of integers counting the spaces. The indentation information is queried at strategic places in the parser but ignored otherwise: The pseudo terminal IND{>} denotes an indentation that consists of more spaces than the entry at the top of the stack; IND{=} an indentation that has the same number of spaces. DED is another pseudo terminal that describes the action of popping a value from the stack, IND{>} then implies to push onto the stack.
With this notation we can now easily define the core of the grammar: A block of statements (simplified example):
ifStmt = 'if' expr ':' stmt
(IND{=} 'elif' expr ':' stmt)*
(IND{=} 'else' ':' stmt)?
simpleStmt = ifStmt / ...
stmt = IND{>} stmt ^+ IND{=} DED # list of statements
/ simpleStmt # or a simple statement Comments start anywhere outside a string or character literal with the hash character #. Comments consist of a concatenation of comment pieces. A comment piece starts with # and runs until the end of the line. The end of line characters belong to the piece. If the next line only consists of a comment piece with no other tokens between it and the preceding one, it does not start a new comment:
i = 0 # This is a single comment over multiple lines. # The scanner merges these two pieces. # The comment continues here.
Documentation comments are comments that start with two ##. Documentation comments are tokens; they are only allowed at certain places in the input file as they belong to the syntax tree!
Starting with version 0.13.0 of the language Nim supports multiline comments. They look like:
#[Comment here. Multiple lines are not a problem.]#
Multiline comments support nesting:
#[ #[ Multiline comment in already commented out code. ]# proc p[T](x: T) = discard ]#
Multiline documentation comments also exist and support nesting too:
proc foo = ##[Long documentation comment here. ]##
Identifiers in Nim can be any string of letters, digits and underscores, beginning with a letter. Two immediate following underscores __ are not allowed:
letter ::= 'A'..'Z' | 'a'..'z' | '\x80'..'\xff' digit ::= '0'..'9' IDENTIFIER ::= letter ( ['_'] (letter | digit) )*
Currently any Unicode character with an ordinal value > 127 (non ASCII) is classified as a letter and may thus be part of an identifier but later versions of the language may assign some Unicode characters to belong to the operator characters instead.
The following keywords are reserved and cannot be used as identifiers:
addr and as asm atomic bind block break case cast concept const continue converter defer discard distinct div do elif else end enum except export finally for from func generic if import in include interface is isnot iterator let macro method mixin mod nil not notin object of or out proc ptr raise ref return shl shr static template try tuple type using var when while with without xor yield
Some keywords are unused; they are reserved for future developments of the language.
Two identifiers are considered equal if the following algorithm returns true:
proc sameIdentifier(a, b: string): bool =
a[0] == b[0] and
a.replace("_", "").toLower == b.replace("_", "").toLower
That means only the first letters are compared in a case sensitive manner. Other letters are compared case insensitively and underscores are ignored.
This rather unorthodox way to do identifier comparisons is called partial case insensitivity and has some advantages over the conventional case sensitivity:
It allows programmers to mostly use their own preferred spelling style, be it humpStyle, snake_style or dash–style and libraries written by different programmers cannot use incompatible conventions. A Nim-aware editor or IDE can show the identifiers as preferred. Another advantage is that it frees the programmer from remembering the exact spelling of an identifier. The exception with respect to the first letter allows common code like var foo: Foo to be parsed unambiguously.
Historically, Nim was a fully style-insensitive language. This meant that it was not case-sensitive and underscores were ignored and there was no even a distinction between foo and Foo.
Terminal symbol in the grammar: STR_LIT.
String literals can be delimited by matching double quotes, and can contain the following escape sequences:
| Escape sequence | Meaning |
|---|---|
\n |
newline |
\r, \c
|
carriage return |
\l |
line feed |
\f |
form feed |
\t |
tabulator |
\v |
vertical tabulator |
\\ |
backslash |
\" |
quotation mark |
\' |
apostrophe |
\ '0'..'9'+ |
character with decimal value d; all decimal digits directly following are used for the character |
\a |
alert |
\b |
backspace |
\e |
escape [ESC] |
\x HH |
character with hex value HH; exactly two hex digits are allowed |
Strings in Nim may contain any 8-bit value, even embedded zeros. However some operations may interpret the first binary zero as a terminator.
Terminal symbol in the grammar: TRIPLESTR_LIT.
String literals can also be delimited by three double quotes """ ... """. Literals in this form may run for several lines, may contain " and do not interpret any escape sequences. For convenience, when the opening """ is followed by a newline (there may be whitespace between the opening """ and the newline), the newline (and the preceding whitespace) is not included in the string. The ending of the string literal is defined by the pattern """[^"], so this:
""""long string within quotes""""
Produces:
"long string within quotes"
Terminal symbol in the grammar: RSTR_LIT.
There are also raw string literals that are preceded with the letter r (or R) and are delimited by matching double quotes (just like ordinary string literals) and do not interpret the escape sequences. This is especially convenient for regular expressions or Windows paths:
var f = openFile(r"C:\texts\text.txt") # a raw string, so ``\t`` is no tab
To produce a single " within a raw string literal, it has to be doubled:
r"a""b"
Produces:
a"b
r"""" is not possible with this notation, because the three leading quotes introduce a triple quoted string literal. r""" is the same as """ since triple quoted string literals do not interpret escape sequences either.
Terminal symbols in the grammar: GENERALIZED_STR_LIT, GENERALIZED_TRIPLESTR_LIT.
The construct identifier"string literal" (without whitespace between the identifier and the opening quotation mark) is a generalized raw string literal. It is a shortcut for the construct identifier(r"string literal"), so it denotes a procedure call with a raw string literal as its only argument. Generalized raw string literals are especially convenient for embedding mini languages directly into Nim (for example regular expressions).
The construct identifier"""string literal""" exists too. It is a shortcut for identifier("""string literal""").
Character literals are enclosed in single quotes '' and can contain the same escape sequences as strings - with one exception: newline (\n) is not allowed as it may be wider than one character (often it is the pair CR/LF for example). Here are the valid escape sequences for character literals:
| Escape sequence | Meaning |
|---|---|
\r, \c
|
carriage return |
\l |
line feed |
\f |
form feed |
\t |
tabulator |
\v |
vertical tabulator |
\\ |
backslash |
\" |
quotation mark |
\' |
apostrophe |
\ '0'..'9'+ |
character with decimal value d; all decimal digits directly following are used for the character |
\a |
alert |
\b |
backspace |
\e |
escape [ESC] |
\x HH |
character with hex value HH; exactly two hex digits are allowed |
A character is not an Unicode character but a single byte. The reason for this is efficiency: for the overwhelming majority of use-cases, the resulting programs will still handle UTF-8 properly as UTF-8 was specially designed for this. Another reason is that Nim can thus support array[char, int] or set[char] efficiently as many algorithms rely on this feature. The Rune type is used for Unicode characters, it can represent any Unicode character. Rune is declared in the unicode module.
Numerical constants are of a single type and have the form:
hexdigit = digit | 'A'..'F' | 'a'..'f'
octdigit = '0'..'7'
bindigit = '0'..'1'
HEX_LIT = '0' ('x' | 'X' ) hexdigit ( ['_'] hexdigit )*
DEC_LIT = digit ( ['_'] digit )*
OCT_LIT = '0' ('o' | 'c' | 'C') octdigit ( ['_'] octdigit )*
BIN_LIT = '0' ('b' | 'B' ) bindigit ( ['_'] bindigit )*
INT_LIT = HEX_LIT
| DEC_LIT
| OCT_LIT
| BIN_LIT
INT8_LIT = INT_LIT ['\''] ('i' | 'I') '8'
INT16_LIT = INT_LIT ['\''] ('i' | 'I') '16'
INT32_LIT = INT_LIT ['\''] ('i' | 'I') '32'
INT64_LIT = INT_LIT ['\''] ('i' | 'I') '64'
UINT_LIT = INT_LIT ['\''] ('u' | 'U')
UINT8_LIT = INT_LIT ['\''] ('u' | 'U') '8'
UINT16_LIT = INT_LIT ['\''] ('u' | 'U') '16'
UINT32_LIT = INT_LIT ['\''] ('u' | 'U') '32'
UINT64_LIT = INT_LIT ['\''] ('u' | 'U') '64'
exponent = ('e' | 'E' ) ['+' | '-'] digit ( ['_'] digit )*
FLOAT_LIT = digit (['_'] digit)* (('.' (['_'] digit)* [exponent]) |exponent)
FLOAT32_SUFFIX = ('f' | 'F') ['32']
FLOAT32_LIT = HEX_LIT '\'' FLOAT32_SUFFIX
| (FLOAT_LIT | DEC_LIT | OCT_LIT | BIN_LIT) ['\''] FLOAT32_SUFFIX
FLOAT64_SUFFIX = ( ('f' | 'F') '64' ) | 'd' | 'D'
FLOAT64_LIT = HEX_LIT '\'' FLOAT64_SUFFIX
| (FLOAT_LIT | DEC_LIT | OCT_LIT | BIN_LIT) ['\''] FLOAT64_SUFFIX As can be seen in the productions, numerical constants can contain underscores for readability. Integer and floating point literals may be given in decimal (no prefix), binary (prefix 0b), octal (prefix 0o or 0c) and hexadecimal (prefix 0x) notation.
There exists a literal for each numerical type that is defined. The suffix starting with an apostrophe (''') is called a type suffix. Literals without a type suffix are of the type int, unless the literal contains a dot or E|e in which case it is of type float. For notational convenience the apostrophe of a type suffix is optional if it is not ambiguous (only hexadecimal floating point literals with a type suffix can be ambiguous).
The type suffixes are:
| Type Suffix | Resulting type of literal |
|---|---|
'i8 |
int8 |
'i16 |
int16 |
'i32 |
int32 |
'i64 |
int64 |
'u |
uint |
'u8 |
uint8 |
'u16 |
uint16 |
'u32 |
uint32 |
'u64 |
uint64 |
'f |
float32 |
'd |
float64 |
'f32 |
float32 |
'f64 |
float64 |
'f128 |
float128 |
Floating point literals may also be in binary, octal or hexadecimal notation: 0B0_10001110100_0000101001000111101011101111111011000101001101001001'f64 is approximately 1.72826e35 according to the IEEE floating point standard.
Literals are bounds checked so that they fit the datatype. Non base-10 literals are used mainly for flags and bit pattern representations, therefore bounds checking is done on bit width, not value range. If the literal fits in the bit width of the datatype, it is accepted. Hence: 0b10000000'u8 == 0x80'u8 == 128, but, 0b10000000'i8 == 0x80'i8 == -1 instead of causing an overflow error.
Nim allows user defined operators. An operator is any combination of the following characters:
= + - * / < > @ $ ~ & % | ! ? ^ . : \
These keywords are also operators: and or not xor shl shr div mod in notin is isnot of.
=, :, :: are not available as general operators; they are used for other notational purposes.
*: is as a special case treated as the two tokens * and : (to support var v*: T).
The following strings denote other tokens:
` ( ) { } [ ] , ; [. .] {. .} (. .) The slice operator .. takes precedence over other tokens that contain a dot: {..} are the three tokens {, .., } and not the two tokens {., .}.
This section lists Nim's standard syntax. How the parser handles the indentation is already described in the Lexical Analysis section.
Nim allows user-definable operators. Binary operators have 11 different levels of precedence.
Binary operators whose first character is ^ are right-associative, all other binary operators are left-associative.
proc `^/`(x, y: float): float = # a right-associative division operator result = x / y echo 12 ^/ 4 ^/ 8 # 24.0 (4 / 8 = 0.5, then 12 / 0.5 = 24.0) echo 12 / 4 / 8 # 0.375 (12 / 4 = 3.0, then 3 / 8 = 0.375)
Unary operators always bind stronger than any binary operator: $a + b is ($a) + b and not $(a + b).
If an unary operator's first character is @ it is a sigil-like operator which binds stronger than a primarySuffix: @x.abc is parsed as (@x).abc whereas $x.abc is parsed as $(x.abc).
For binary operators that are not keywords the precedence is determined by the following rules:
Operators ending in either ->, ~> or => are called arrow like, and have the lowest precedence of all operators.
If the operator ends with = and its first character is none of <, >, !, =, ~, ?, it is an assignment operator which has the second lowest precedence.
Otherwise precedence is determined by the first character.
| Precedence level | Operators | First character | Terminal symbol |
|---|---|---|---|
| 10 (highest) | $ ^ |
OP10 | |
| 9 | * / div mod shl shr % |
* % \ / |
OP9 |
| 8 | + - |
+ - ~ | |
OP8 |
| 7 | & |
& |
OP7 |
| 6 | .. |
. |
OP6 |
| 5 | == <= < >= > != in notin is isnot not of |
= < > ! |
OP5 |
| 4 | and |
OP4 | |
| 3 | or xor |
OP3 | |
| 2 | @ : ? |
OP2 | |
| 1 |
assignment operator (like +=, *=) |
OP1 | |
| 0 (lowest) |
arrow like operator (like ->, =>) |
OP0 |
Whether an operator is used a prefix operator is also affected by preceding whitespace (this parsing change was introduced with version 0.13.0):
echo $foo # is parsed as echo($foo)
The grammar's start symbol is module.
module = stmt ^* (';' / IND{=})
comma = ',' COMMENT?
semicolon = ';' COMMENT?
colon = ':' COMMENT?
colcom = ':' COMMENT?
operator = OP0 | OP1 | OP2 | OP3 | OP4 | OP5 | OP6 | OP7 | OP8 | OP9
| 'or' | 'xor' | 'and'
| 'is' | 'isnot' | 'in' | 'notin' | 'of'
| 'div' | 'mod' | 'shl' | 'shr' | 'not' | 'static' | '..'
prefixOperator = operator
optInd = COMMENT?
optPar = (IND{>} | IND{=})?
simpleExpr = arrowExpr (OP0 optInd arrowExpr)* pragma?
arrowExpr = assignExpr (OP1 optInd assignExpr)*
assignExpr = orExpr (OP2 optInd orExpr)*
orExpr = andExpr (OP3 optInd andExpr)*
andExpr = cmpExpr (OP4 optInd cmpExpr)*
cmpExpr = sliceExpr (OP5 optInd sliceExpr)*
sliceExpr = ampExpr (OP6 optInd ampExpr)*
ampExpr = plusExpr (OP7 optInd plusExpr)*
plusExpr = mulExpr (OP8 optInd mulExpr)*
mulExpr = dollarExpr (OP9 optInd dollarExpr)*
dollarExpr = primary (OP10 optInd primary)*
symbol = '`' (KEYW|IDENT|literal|(operator|'('|')'|'['|']'|'{'|'}'|'=')+)+ '`'
| IDENT | KEYW
exprColonEqExpr = expr (':'|'=' expr)?
exprList = expr ^+ comma
dotExpr = expr '.' optInd symbol
qualifiedIdent = symbol ('.' optInd symbol)?
exprColonEqExprList = exprColonEqExpr (comma exprColonEqExpr)* (comma)?
setOrTableConstr = '{' ((exprColonEqExpr comma)* | ':' ) '}'
castExpr = 'cast' '[' optInd typeDesc optPar ']' '(' optInd expr optPar ')'
parKeyw = 'discard' | 'include' | 'if' | 'while' | 'case' | 'try'
| 'finally' | 'except' | 'for' | 'block' | 'const' | 'let'
| 'when' | 'var' | 'mixin'
par = '(' optInd
( &parKeyw complexOrSimpleStmt ^+ ';'
| ';' complexOrSimpleStmt ^+ ';'
| pragmaStmt
| simpleExpr ( ('=' expr (';' complexOrSimpleStmt ^+ ';' )? )
| (':' expr (',' exprColonEqExpr ^+ ',' )? ) ) )
optPar ')'
literal = | INT_LIT | INT8_LIT | INT16_LIT | INT32_LIT | INT64_LIT
| UINT_LIT | UINT8_LIT | UINT16_LIT | UINT32_LIT | UINT64_LIT
| FLOAT_LIT | FLOAT32_LIT | FLOAT64_LIT
| STR_LIT | RSTR_LIT | TRIPLESTR_LIT
| CHAR_LIT
| NIL
generalizedLit = GENERALIZED_STR_LIT | GENERALIZED_TRIPLESTR_LIT
identOrLiteral = generalizedLit | symbol | literal
| par | arrayConstr | setOrTableConstr
| castExpr
tupleConstr = '(' optInd (exprColonEqExpr comma?)* optPar ')'
arrayConstr = '[' optInd (exprColonEqExpr comma?)* optPar ']'
primarySuffix = '(' (exprColonEqExpr comma?)* ')' doBlocks?
| doBlocks
| '.' optInd symbol generalizedLit?
| '[' optInd indexExprList optPar ']'
| '{' optInd indexExprList optPar '}'
| &( '`'|IDENT|literal|'cast'|'addr'|'type') expr # command syntax
condExpr = expr colcom expr optInd
('elif' expr colcom expr optInd)*
'else' colcom expr
ifExpr = 'if' condExpr
whenExpr = 'when' condExpr
pragma = '{.' optInd (exprColonExpr comma?)* optPar ('.}' | '}')
identVis = symbol opr? # postfix position
identVisDot = symbol '.' optInd symbol opr?
identWithPragma = identVis pragma?
identWithPragmaDot = identVisDot pragma?
declColonEquals = identWithPragma (comma identWithPragma)* comma?
(':' optInd typeDesc)? ('=' optInd expr)?
identColonEquals = ident (comma ident)* comma?
(':' optInd typeDesc)? ('=' optInd expr)?)
inlTupleDecl = 'tuple'
[' optInd (identColonEquals (comma/semicolon)?)* optPar ']'
extTupleDecl = 'tuple'
COMMENT? (IND{>} identColonEquals (IND{=} identColonEquals)*)?
tupleClass = 'tuple'
paramList = '(' declColonEquals ^* (comma/semicolon) ')'
paramListArrow = paramList? ('->' optInd typeDesc)?
paramListColon = paramList? (':' optInd typeDesc)?
doBlock = 'do' paramListArrow pragmas? colcom stmt
procExpr = 'proc' paramListColon pragmas? ('=' COMMENT? stmt)?
distinct = 'distinct' optInd typeDesc
expr = (ifExpr
| whenExpr
| caseExpr
| tryExpr)
/ simpleExpr
typeKeyw = 'var' | 'out' | 'ref' | 'ptr' | 'shared' | 'tuple'
| 'proc' | 'iterator' | 'distinct' | 'object' | 'enum'
primary = typeKeyw typeDescK
/ prefixOperator* identOrLiteral primarySuffix*
/ 'static' primary
/ 'bind' primary
typeDesc = simpleExpr
typeDefAux = simpleExpr
| 'concept' typeClass
postExprBlocks = ':' stmt? ( IND{=} doBlock
| IND{=} 'of' exprList ':' stmt
| IND{=} 'elif' expr ':' stmt
| IND{=} 'except' exprList ':' stmt
| IND{=} 'else' ':' stmt )*
exprStmt = simpleExpr
(( '=' optInd expr colonBody? )
/ ( expr ^+ comma
doBlocks
/ macroColon
))?
importStmt = 'import' optInd expr
((comma expr)*
/ 'except' optInd (expr ^+ comma))
includeStmt = 'include' optInd expr ^+ comma
fromStmt = 'from' moduleName 'import' optInd expr (comma expr)*
returnStmt = 'return' optInd expr?
raiseStmt = 'raise' optInd expr?
yieldStmt = 'yield' optInd expr?
discardStmt = 'discard' optInd expr?
breakStmt = 'break' optInd expr?
continueStmt = 'break' optInd expr?
condStmt = expr colcom stmt COMMENT?
(IND{=} 'elif' expr colcom stmt)*
(IND{=} 'else' colcom stmt)?
ifStmt = 'if' condStmt
whenStmt = 'when' condStmt
whileStmt = 'while' expr colcom stmt
ofBranch = 'of' exprList colcom stmt
ofBranches = ofBranch (IND{=} ofBranch)*
(IND{=} 'elif' expr colcom stmt)*
(IND{=} 'else' colcom stmt)?
caseStmt = 'case' expr ':'? COMMENT?
(IND{>} ofBranches DED
| IND{=} ofBranches)
tryStmt = 'try' colcom stmt &(IND{=}? 'except'|'finally')
(IND{=}? 'except' exprList colcom stmt)*
(IND{=}? 'finally' colcom stmt)?
tryExpr = 'try' colcom stmt &(optInd 'except'|'finally')
(optInd 'except' exprList colcom stmt)*
(optInd 'finally' colcom stmt)?
exceptBlock = 'except' colcom stmt
forStmt = 'for' (identWithPragma ^+ comma) 'in' expr colcom stmt
blockStmt = 'block' symbol? colcom stmt
staticStmt = 'static' colcom stmt
deferStmt = 'defer' colcom stmt
asmStmt = 'asm' pragma? (STR_LIT | RSTR_LIT | TRIPLE_STR_LIT)
genericParam = symbol (comma symbol)* (colon expr)? ('=' optInd expr)?
genericParamList = '[' optInd
genericParam ^* (comma/semicolon) optPar ']'
pattern = '{' stmt '}'
indAndComment = (IND{>} COMMENT)? | COMMENT?
routine = optInd identVis pattern? genericParamList?
paramListColon pragma? ('=' COMMENT? stmt)? indAndComment
commentStmt = COMMENT
section(p) = COMMENT? p / (IND{>} (p / COMMENT)^+IND{=} DED)
constant = identWithPragma (colon typedesc)? '=' optInd expr indAndComment
enum = 'enum' optInd (symbol optInd ('=' optInd expr COMMENT?)? comma?)+
objectWhen = 'when' expr colcom objectPart COMMENT?
('elif' expr colcom objectPart COMMENT?)*
('else' colcom objectPart COMMENT?)?
objectBranch = 'of' exprList colcom objectPart
objectBranches = objectBranch (IND{=} objectBranch)*
(IND{=} 'elif' expr colcom objectPart)*
(IND{=} 'else' colcom objectPart)?
objectCase = 'case' identWithPragma ':' typeDesc ':'? COMMENT?
(IND{>} objectBranches DED
| IND{=} objectBranches)
objectPart = IND{>} objectPart^+IND{=} DED
/ objectWhen / objectCase / 'nil' / 'discard' / declColonEquals
object = 'object' pragma? ('of' typeDesc)? COMMENT? objectPart
typeClassParam = ('var' | 'out')? symbol
typeClass = typeClassParam ^* ',' (pragma)? ('of' typeDesc ^* ',')?
&IND{>} stmt
typeDef = identWithPragmaDot genericParamList? '=' optInd typeDefAux
indAndComment?
varTuple = '(' optInd identWithPragma ^+ comma optPar ')' '=' optInd expr
colonBody = colcom stmt doBlocks?
variable = (varTuple / identColonEquals) colonBody? indAndComment
bindStmt = 'bind' optInd qualifiedIdent ^+ comma
mixinStmt = 'mixin' optInd qualifiedIdent ^+ comma
pragmaStmt = pragma (':' COMMENT? stmt)?
simpleStmt = ((returnStmt | raiseStmt | yieldStmt | discardStmt | breakStmt
| continueStmt | pragmaStmt | importStmt | exportStmt | fromStmt
| includeStmt | commentStmt) / exprStmt) COMMENT?
complexOrSimpleStmt = (ifStmt | whenStmt | whileStmt
| tryStmt | forStmt
| blockStmt | staticStmt | deferStmt | asmStmt
| 'proc' routine
| 'method' routine
| 'iterator' routine
| 'macro' routine
| 'template' routine
| 'converter' routine
| 'type' section(typeDef)
| 'const' section(constant)
| ('let' | 'var' | 'using') section(variable)
| bindStmt | mixinStmt)
/ simpleStmt
stmt = (IND{>} complexOrSimpleStmt^+(IND{=} / ';') DED)
/ simpleStmt ^+ ';' All expressions have a type which is known at compile time. Nim is statically typed. One can declare new types, which is in essence defining an identifier that can be used to denote this custom type.
These are the major type classes:
Ordinal types have the following characteristics:
inc, ord, dec on ordinal types to be defined.Integers, bool, characters and enumeration types (and subranges of these types) belong to ordinal types. For reasons of simplicity of implementation the types uint and uint64 are not ordinal types.
These integer types are pre-defined:
intint8, int16, int32, int64. Literals of these types have the suffix 'iXX.uint'u is of this type.uint8, uint16, uint32, uint64. Literals of these types have the suffix 'uXX. Unsigned operations all wrap around; they cannot lead to over- or underflow errors.In addition to the usual arithmetic operators for signed and unsigned integers (+ - * etc.) there are also operators that formally work on signed integers but treat their arguments as unsigned: They are mostly provided for backwards compatibility with older versions of the language that lacked unsigned integer types. These unsigned operations for signed integers use the % suffix as convention:
| operation | meaning |
|---|---|
a +% b |
unsigned integer addition |
a -% b |
unsigned integer subtraction |
a *% b |
unsigned integer multiplication |
a /% b |
unsigned integer division |
a %% b |
unsigned integer modulo operation |
a <% b |
treat a and b as unsigned and compare |
a <=% b |
treat a and b as unsigned and compare |
ze(a) |
extends the bits of a with zeros until it has the width of the int type |
toU8(a) |
treats a as unsigned and converts it to an unsigned integer of 8 bits (but still the int8 type) |
toU16(a) |
treats a as unsigned and converts it to an unsigned integer of 16 bits (but still the int16 type) |
toU32(a) |
treats a as unsigned and converts it to an unsigned integer of 32 bits (but still the int32 type) |
Automatic type conversion is performed in expressions where different kinds of integer types are used: the smaller type is converted to the larger.
A narrowing type conversion converts a larger to a smaller type (for example int32 -> int16. A widening type conversion converts a smaller type to a larger type (for example int16 -> int32). In Nim only widening type conversions are implicit:
var myInt16 = 5i16 var myInt: int myInt16 + 34 # of type ``int16`` myInt16 + myInt # of type ``int`` myInt16 + 2i32 # of type ``int32``
However, int literals are implicitly convertible to a smaller integer type if the literal's value fits this smaller type and such a conversion is less expensive than other implicit conversions, so myInt16 + 34 produces an int16 result.
For further details, see Convertible relation.
A subrange type is a range of values from an ordinal type (the base type). To define a subrange type, one must specify it's limiting values: the lowest and highest value of the type:
type Subrange = range[0..5]
Subrange is a subrange of an integer which can only hold the values 0 to 5. Assigning any other value to a variable of type Subrange is a checked runtime error (or static error if it can be statically determined). Assignments from the base type to one of its subrange types (and vice versa) are allowed.
A subrange type has the same size as its base type (int in the example).
Nim requires interval arithmetic for subrange types over a set of built-in operators that involve constants: x %% 3 is of type range[0..2]. The following built-in operators for integers are affected by this rule: -, +, *, min, max, succ, pred, mod, div, %%, and (bitwise and).
Bitwise and only produces a range if one of its operands is a constant x so that (x+1) is a power of two. (Bitwise and is then a %% operation.)
This means that the following code is accepted:
case (x and 3) + 7 of 7: echo "A" of 8: echo "B" of 9: echo "C" of 10: echo "D" # note: no ``else`` required as (x and 3) + 7 has the type: range[7..10]
The following floating point types are pre-defined:
floatfloat32 and float64. Literals of these types have the suffix 'fXX.Automatic type conversion in expressions with different kinds of floating point types is performed: See Convertible relation for further details. Arithmetic performed on floating point types follows the IEEE standard. Integer types are not converted to floating point types automatically and vice versa.
The IEEE standard defines five types of floating-point exceptions:
The IEEE exceptions are either ignored at runtime or mapped to the Nim exceptions: FloatInvalidOpError, FloatDivByZeroError, FloatOverflowError, FloatUnderflowError, and FloatInexactError. These exceptions inherit from the FloatingPointError base class.
Nim provides the pragmas NaNChecks and InfChecks to control whether the IEEE exceptions are ignored or trap a Nim exception:
{.NanChecks: on, InfChecks: on.}
var a = 1.0
var b = 0.0
echo b / b # raises FloatInvalidOpError
echo a / b # raises FloatOverflowError
In the current implementation FloatDivByZeroError and FloatInexactError are never raised. FloatOverflowError is raised instead of FloatDivByZeroError. There is also a floatChecks pragma that is a short-cut for the combination of NaNChecks and InfChecks pragmas. floatChecks are turned off as default.
The only operations that are affected by the floatChecks pragma are the +, -, *, / operators for floating point types.
An implementation should always use the maximum precision available to evaluate floating pointer values at compile time; this means expressions like 0.09'f32 + 0.01'f32 == 0.09'f64 + 0.01'f64 are true.
The boolean type is named bool in Nim and can be one of the two pre-defined values true and false. Conditions in while, if, elif, when-statements need to be of type bool.
This condition holds:
ord(false) == 0 and ord(true) == 1
The operators not, and, or, xor, <, <=, >, >=, !=, == are defined for the bool type. The and and or operators perform short-cut evaluation. Example:
while p != nil and p.name != "xyz": # p.name is not evaluated if p == nil p = p.next
The size of the bool type is one byte.
The character type is named char in Nim. Its size is one byte. Thus it cannot represent an UTF-8 character, but a part of it. The reason for this is efficiency: for the overwhelming majority of use-cases, the resulting programs will still handle UTF-8 properly as UTF-8 was specially designed for this. Another reason is that Nim can support array[char, int] or set[char] efficiently as many algorithms rely on this feature. The Rune type is used for Unicode characters, it can represent any Unicode character. Rune is declared in the unicode module.
Enumeration types define a new type whose values consist of the ones specified. The values are ordered. Example:
type
Direction = enum
north, east, south, west
Now the following holds:
ord(north) == 0 ord(east) == 1 ord(south) == 2 ord(west) == 3
Thus, north < east < south < west. The comparison operators can be used with enumeration types.
For better interfacing to other programming languages, the fields of enum types can be assigned an explicit ordinal value. However, the ordinal values have to be in ascending order. A field whose ordinal value is not explicitly given is assigned the value of the previous field + 1.
An explicit ordered enum can have holes:
type
TokenType = enum
a = 2, b = 4, c = 89 # holes are valid
However, it is then not an ordinal anymore, so it is not possible to use these enums as an index type for arrays. The procedures inc, dec, succ and pred are not available for them either.
The compiler supports the built-in stringify operator $ for enumerations. The stringify's result can be controlled by explicitly giving the string values to use:
type
MyEnum = enum
valueA = (0, "my value A"),
valueB = "value B",
valueC = 2,
valueD = (3, "abc")
As can be seen from the example, it is possible to both specify a field's ordinal value and its string value by using a tuple. It is also possible to only specify one of them.
An enum can be marked with the pure pragma so that it's fields are not added to the current scope, so they always need to be accessed via MyEnum.value:
type
MyEnum {.pure.} = enum
valueA, valueB, valueC, valueD
echo valueA # error: Unknown identifier
echo MyEnum.valueA # works All string literals are of the type string. A string in Nim is very similar to a sequence of characters. However, strings in Nim are both zero-terminated and have a length field. One can retrieve the length with the builtin len procedure; the length never counts the terminating zero. The assignment operator for strings always copies the string. The & operator concatenates strings.
Most native Nim types support conversion to strings with the special $ proc. When calling the echo proc, for example, the built-in stringify operation for the parameter is called:
echo 3 # calls `$` for `int`
Whenever a user creates a specialized object, implementation of this procedure provides for string representation.
type
Person = object
name: string
age: int
proc `$`(p: Person): string = # `$` always returns a string
result = p.name & " is " &
$p.age & # we *need* the `$` in front of p.age, which
# is natively an integer, to convert it to
# a string
" years old."
While $p.name can also be used, the $ operation on a string does nothing. Note that we cannot rely on automatic conversion from an int to a string like we can for the echo proc.
Strings are compared by their lexicographical order. All comparison operators are available. Strings can be indexed like arrays (lower bound is 0). Unlike arrays, they can be used in case statements:
case paramStr(i) of "-v": incl(options, optVerbose) of "-h", "-?": incl(options, optHelp) else: write(stdout, "invalid command line option!\n")
Per convention, all strings are UTF-8 strings, but this is not enforced. For example, when reading strings from binary files, they are merely a sequence of bytes. The index operation s[i] means the i-th char of s, not the i-th unichar. The iterator runes from the unicode module can be used for iteration over all Unicode characters.
The cstring type meaning compatible string is the native representation of a string for the compilation backend. For the C backend the cstring type represents a pointer to a zero-terminated char array compatible to the type char* in Ansi C. Its primary purpose lies in easy interfacing with C. The index operation s[i] means the i-th char of s; however no bounds checking for cstring is performed making the index operation unsafe.
A Nim string is implicitly convertible to cstring for convenience. If a Nim string is passed to a C-style variadic proc, it is implicitly converted to cstring too:
proc printf(formatstr: cstring) {.importc: "printf", varargs,
header: "<stdio.h>".}
printf("This works %s", "as expected")
Even though the conversion is implicit, it is not safe: The garbage collector does not consider a cstring to be a root and may collect the underlying memory. However in practice this almost never happens as the GC considers stack roots conservatively. One can use the builtin procs GC_ref and GC_unref to keep the string data alive for the rare cases where it does not work.
A $ proc is defined for cstrings that returns a string. Thus to get a nim string from a cstring:
var str: string = "Hello!" var cstr: cstring = str var newstr: string = $cstr
A variable of a structured type can hold multiple values at the same time. Structured types can be nested to unlimited levels. Arrays, sequences, tuples, objects and sets belong to the structured types.
Arrays are a homogeneous type, meaning that each element in the array has the same type. Arrays always have a fixed length which is specified at compile time (except for open arrays). They can be indexed by any ordinal type. A parameter A may be an open array, in which case it is indexed by integers from 0 to len(A)-1. An array expression may be constructed by the array constructor []. The element type of this array expression is inferred from the type of the first element. All other elements need to be implicitly convertable to this type.
Sequences are similar to arrays but of dynamic length which may change during runtime (like strings). Sequences are implemented as growable arrays, allocating pieces of memory as items are added. A sequence S is always indexed by integers from 0 to len(S)-1 and its bounds are checked. Sequences can be constructed by the array constructor [] in conjunction with the array to sequence operator @. Another way to allocate space for a sequence is to call the built-in newSeq procedure.
A sequence may be passed to a parameter that is of type open array.
Example:
type IntArray = array[0..5, int] # an array that is indexed with 0..5 IntSeq = seq[int] # a sequence of integers var x: IntArray y: IntSeq x = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6] # [] is the array constructor y = @[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6] # the @ turns the array into a sequence let z = [1.0, 2, 3, 4] # the type of z is array[0..3, float]
The lower bound of an array or sequence may be received by the built-in proc low(), the higher bound by high(). The length may be received by len(). low() for a sequence or an open array always returns 0, as this is the first valid index. One can append elements to a sequence with the add() proc or the & operator, and remove (and get) the last element of a sequence with the pop() proc.
The notation x[i] can be used to access the i-th element of x.
Arrays are always bounds checked (at compile-time or at runtime). These checks can be disabled via pragmas or invoking the compiler with the --boundChecks:off command line switch.
Often fixed size arrays turn out to be too inflexible; procedures should be able to deal with arrays of different sizes. The openarray type allows this; it can only be used for parameters. Openarrays are always indexed with an int starting at position 0. The len, low and high operations are available for open arrays too. Any array with a compatible base type can be passed to an openarray parameter, the index type does not matter. In addition to arrays sequences can also be passed to an open array parameter.
The openarray type cannot be nested: multidimensional openarrays are not supported because this is seldom needed and cannot be done efficiently.
proc testOpenArray(x: openArray[int]) = echo repr(x) testOpenArray([1,2,3]) # array[] testOpenArray(@[1,2,3]) # seq[]
A varargs parameter is an openarray parameter that additionally allows to pass a variable number of arguments to a procedure. The compiler converts the list of arguments to an array implicitly:
proc myWriteln(f: File, a: varargs[string]) =
for s in items(a):
write(f, s)
write(f, "\n")
myWriteln(stdout, "abc", "def", "xyz")
# is transformed to:
myWriteln(stdout, ["abc", "def", "xyz"])
This transformation is only done if the varargs parameter is the last parameter in the procedure header. It is also possible to perform type conversions in this context:
proc myWriteln(f: File, a: varargs[string, `$`]) =
for s in items(a):
write(f, s)
write(f, "\n")
myWriteln(stdout, 123, "abc", 4.0)
# is transformed to:
myWriteln(stdout, [$123, $"def", $4.0])
In this example $ is applied to any argument that is passed to the parameter a. (Note that $ applied to strings is a nop.)
Note that an explicit array constructor passed to a varargs parameter is not wrapped in another implicit array construction:
proc takeV[T](a: varargs[T]) = discard takeV([123, 2, 1]) # takeV's T is "int", not "array of int"
varargs[typed] is treated specially: It matches a variable list of arguments of arbitrary type but always constructs an implicit array. This is required so that the builtin echo proc does what is expected:
proc echo*(x: varargs[typed, `$`]) {...}
echo @[1, 2, 3]
# prints "@[1, 2, 3]" and not "123" A variable of a tuple or object type is a heterogeneous storage container. A tuple or object defines various named fields of a type. A tuple also defines an order of the fields. Tuples are meant for heterogeneous storage types with no overhead and few abstraction possibilities. The constructor () can be used to construct tuples. The order of the fields in the constructor must match the order of the tuple's definition. Different tuple-types are equivalent if they specify the same fields of the same type in the same order. The names of the fields also have to be identical.
The assignment operator for tuples copies each component. The default assignment operator for objects copies each component. Overloading of the assignment operator for objects is not possible, but this will change in future versions of the compiler.
type
Person = tuple[name: string, age: int] # type representing a person:
# a person consists of a name
# and an age
var
person: Person
person = (name: "Peter", age: 30)
# the same, but less readable:
person = ("Peter", 30)
The implementation aligns the fields for best access performance. The alignment is compatible with the way the C compiler does it.
For consistency with object declarations, tuples in a type section can also be defined with indentation instead of []:
type
Person = tuple # type representing a person
name: string # a person consists of a name
age: natural # and an age
Objects provide many features that tuples do not. Object provide inheritance and information hiding. Objects have access to their type at runtime, so that the of operator can be used to determine the object's type. The of operator is similar to the instanceof operator in Java.
type
Person = object of RootObj
name*: string # the * means that `name` is accessible from other modules
age: int # no * means that the field is hidden
Student = ref object of Person # a student is a person
id: int # with an id field
var
student: Student
person: Person
assert(student of Student) # is true
assert(student of Person) # also true
Object fields that should be visible from outside the defining module, have to be marked by *. In contrast to tuples, different object types are never equivalent. Objects that have no ancestor are implicitly final and thus have no hidden type field. One can use the inheritable pragma to introduce new object roots apart from system.RootObj.
Objects can also be created with an object construction expression that has the syntax T(fieldA: valueA, fieldB: valueB, ...) where T is an object type or a ref object type:
var student = Student(name: "Anton", age: 5, id: 3)
Note that, unlike tuples, objects require the field names along with their values. For a ref object type system.new is invoked implicitly.
Often an object hierarchy is overkill in certain situations where simple variant types are needed.
An example:
# This is an example how an abstract syntax tree could be modelled in Nim
type
NodeKind = enum # the different node types
nkInt, # a leaf with an integer value
nkFloat, # a leaf with a float value
nkString, # a leaf with a string value
nkAdd, # an addition
nkSub, # a subtraction
nkIf # an if statement
Node = ref NodeObj
NodeObj = object
case kind: NodeKind # the ``kind`` field is the discriminator
of nkInt: intVal: int
of nkFloat: floatVal: float
of nkString: strVal: string
of nkAdd, nkSub:
leftOp, rightOp: Node
of nkIf:
condition, thenPart, elsePart: Node
# create a new case object:
var n = Node(kind: nkIf, condition: nil)
# accessing n.thenPart is valid because the ``nkIf`` branch is active:
n.thenPart = Node(kind: nkFloat, floatVal: 2.0)
# the following statement raises an `FieldError` exception, because
# n.kind's value does not fit and the ``nkString`` branch is not active:
n.strVal = ""
# invalid: would change the active object branch:
n.kind = nkInt
var x = Node(kind: nkAdd, leftOp: Node(kind: nkInt, intVal: 4),
rightOp: Node(kind: nkInt, intVal: 2))
# valid: does not change the active object branch:
x.kind = nkSub
As can been seen from the example, an advantage to an object hierarchy is that no casting between different object types is needed. Yet, access to invalid object fields raises an exception.
The syntax of case in an object declaration follows closely the syntax of the case statement: The branches in a case section may be indented too.
In the example the kind field is called the discriminator: For safety its address cannot be taken and assignments to it are restricted: The new value must not lead to a change of the active object branch. For an object branch switch system.reset has to be used. Also, when the fields of a particular branch are specified during object construction, the correct value for the discriminator must be supplied at compile-time.
int8-int16
uint8/byte-uint16
charenumor equivalent. The reason is that sets are implemented as high performance bit vectors. Attempting to declare a set with a larger type will result in an error:
var s: set[int64] # Error: set is too large
Sets can be constructed via the set constructor: {} is the empty set. The empty set is type compatible with any concrete set type. The constructor can also be used to include elements (and ranges of elements):
type
CharSet = set[char]
var
x: CharSet
x = {'a'..'z', '0'..'9'} # This constructs a set that contains the
# letters from 'a' to 'z' and the digits
# from '0' to '9'
These operations are supported by sets:
| operation | meaning |
|---|---|
A + B |
union of two sets |
A * B |
intersection of two sets |
A - B |
difference of two sets (A without B's elements) |
A == B |
set equality |
A <= B |
subset relation (A is subset of B or equal to B) |
A < B |
strong subset relation (A is a real subset of B) |
e in A |
set membership (A contains element e) |
e notin A |
A does not contain element e |
contains(A, e) |
A contains element e |
card(A) |
the cardinality of A (number of elements in A) |
incl(A, elem) |
same as A = A + {elem}
|
excl(A, elem) |
same as A = A - {elem}
|
Sets are often used to define a type for the flags of a procedure. This is a much cleaner (and type safe) solution than just defining integer constants that should be or'ed together.
References (similar to pointers in other programming languages) are a way to introduce many-to-one relationships. This means different references can point to and modify the same location in memory (also called aliasing).
Nim distinguishes between traced and untraced references. Untraced references are also called pointers. Traced references point to objects of a garbage collected heap, untraced references point to manually allocated objects or to objects somewhere else in memory. Thus untraced references are unsafe. However for certain low-level operations (accessing the hardware) untraced references are unavoidable.
Traced references are declared with the ref keyword, untraced references are declared with the ptr keyword. In general, a ptr T is implicitly convertible to the pointer type.
An empty subscript [] notation can be used to derefer a reference, the addr procedure returns the address of an item. An address is always an untraced reference. Thus the usage of addr is an unsafe feature.
The . (access a tuple/object field operator) and [] (array/string/sequence index operator) operators perform implicit dereferencing operations for reference types:
type
Node = ref NodeObj
NodeObj = object
le, ri: Node
data: int
var
n: Node
new(n)
n.data = 9
# no need to write n[].data; in fact n[].data is highly discouraged!
Automatic dereferencing is also performed for the first argument of a routine call. But currently this feature has to be only enabled via {.experimental.}:
{.experimental.}
proc depth(x: NodeObj): int = ...
var
n: Node
new(n)
echo n.depth
# no need to write n[].depth either
In order to simplify structural type checking, recursive tuples are not valid:
# invalid recursion type MyTuple = tuple[a: ref MyTuple]
Likewise T = ref T is an invalid type.
As a syntactical extension object types can be anonymous if declared in a type section via the ref object or ptr object notations. This feature is useful if an object should only gain reference semantics:
type
Node = ref object
le, ri: Node
data: int
To allocate a new traced object, the built-in procedure new has to be used. To deal with untraced memory, the procedures alloc, dealloc and realloc can be used. The documentation of the system module contains further information.
If a reference points to nothing, it has the value nil.
Special care has to be taken if an untraced object contains traced objects like traced references, strings or sequences: in order to free everything properly, the built-in procedure GCunref has to be called before freeing the untraced memory manually:
type Data = tuple[x, y: int, s: string] # allocate memory for Data on the heap: var d = cast[ptr Data](alloc0(sizeof(Data))) # create a new string on the garbage collected heap: d.s = "abc" # tell the GC that the string is not needed anymore: GCunref(d.s) # free the memory: dealloc(d)
Without the GCunref call the memory allocated for the d.s string would never be freed. The example also demonstrates two important features for low level programming: the sizeof proc returns the size of a type or value in bytes. The cast operator can circumvent the type system: the compiler is forced to treat the result of the alloc0 call (which returns an untyped pointer) as if it would have the type ptr Data. Casting should only be done if it is unavoidable: it breaks type safety and bugs can lead to mysterious crashes.
Note: The example only works because the memory is initialized to zero (alloc0 instead of alloc does this): d.s is thus initialized to nil which the string assignment can handle. One needs to know low level details like this when mixing garbage collected data with unmanaged memory.
All types for that nil is a valid value can be annotated to exclude nil as a valid value with the not nil annotation:
type PObject = ref TObj not nil TProc = (proc (x, y: int)) not nil proc p(x: PObject) = echo "not nil" # compiler catches this: p(nil) # and also this: var x: PObject p(x)
The compiler ensures that every code path initializes variables which contain non nilable pointers. The details of this analysis are still to be specified here.
The types ref and ptr can get an optional region annotation. A region has to be an object type.
Regions are very useful to separate user space and kernel memory in the development of OS kernels:
type Kernel = object Userspace = object var a: Kernel ptr Stat var b: Userspace ptr Stat # the following does not compile as the pointer types are incompatible: a = b
As the example shows ptr can also be used as a binary operator, region ptr T is a shortcut for ptr[region, T].
In order to make generic code easier to write ptr T is a subtype of ptr[R, T] for any R.
Furthermore the subtype relation of the region object types is lifted to the pointer types: If A <: B then ptr[A, T] <: ptr[B, T]. This can be used to model subregions of memory. As a special typing rule ptr[R, T] is not compatible to pointer to prevent the following from compiling:
# from system
proc dealloc(p: pointer)
# wrap some scripting language
type
PythonsHeap = object
PyObjectHeader = object
rc: int
typ: pointer
PyObject = ptr[PythonsHeap, PyObjectHeader]
proc createPyObject(): PyObject {.importc: "...".}
proc destroyPyObject(x: PyObject) {.importc: "...".}
var foo = createPyObject()
# type error here, how convenient:
dealloc(foo)
Future directions:
string and seq too.private, global and local will prove very useful for the upcoming OpenCL target.lent and unique pointers.A procedural type is internally a pointer to a procedure. nil is an allowed value for variables of a procedural type. Nim uses procedural types to achieve functional programming techniques.
Examples:
proc printItem(x: int) = ...
proc forEach(c: proc (x: int) {.cdecl.}) =
...
forEach(printItem) # this will NOT compile because calling conventions differ
type
OnMouseMove = proc (x, y: int) {.closure.}
proc onMouseMove(mouseX, mouseY: int) =
# has default calling convention
echo "x: ", mouseX, " y: ", mouseY
proc setOnMouseMove(mouseMoveEvent: OnMouseMove) = discard
# ok, 'onMouseMove' has the default calling convention, which is compatible
# to 'closure':
setOnMouseMove(onMouseMove)
A subtle issue with procedural types is that the calling convention of the procedure influences the type compatibility: procedural types are only compatible if they have the same calling convention. As a special extension, a procedure of the calling convention nimcall can be passed to a parameter that expects a proc of the calling convention closure.
Nim supports these calling conventions:
fastcall, but only for C compilers that support fastcall.closure take up two machine words: One for the proc pointer and another one for the pointer to implicitly passed environment.__stdcall keyword.__cdecl keyword.__safecall keyword. The word safe refers to the fact that all hardware registers shall be pushed to the hardware stack.__inline procedures. This is only a hint for the compiler: it may completely ignore it and it may inline procedures that are not marked as inline.__fastcall means.__syscall in C. It is used for interrupts.fastcall to improve speed.Most calling conventions exist only for the Windows 32-bit platform.
The default calling convention is nimcall, unless it is an inner proc (a proc inside of a proc). For an inner proc an analysis is performed whether it accesses its environment. If it does so, it has the calling convention closure, otherwise it has the calling convention nimcall.
A distinct type is new type derived from a base type that is incompatible with its base type. In particular, it is an essential property of a distinct type that it does not imply a subtype relation between it and its base type. Explicit type conversions from a distinct type to its base type and vice versa are allowed.
A distinct type can be used to model different physical units with a numerical base type, for example. The following example models currencies.
Different currencies should not be mixed in monetary calculations. Distinct types are a perfect tool to model different currencies:
type Dollar = distinct int Euro = distinct int var d: Dollar e: Euro echo d + 12 # Error: cannot add a number with no unit and a ``Dollar``
Unfortunately, d + 12.Dollar is not allowed either, because + is defined for int (among others), not for Dollar. So a + for dollars needs to be defined:
proc `+` (x, y: Dollar): Dollar = result = Dollar(int(x) + int(y))
It does not make sense to multiply a dollar with a dollar, but with a number without unit; and the same holds for division:
proc `*` (x: Dollar, y: int): Dollar = result = Dollar(int(x) * y) proc `*` (x: int, y: Dollar): Dollar = result = Dollar(x * int(y)) proc `div` ...
This quickly gets tedious. The implementations are trivial and the compiler should not generate all this code only to optimize it away later - after all + for dollars should produce the same binary code as + for ints. The pragma borrow has been designed to solve this problem; in principle it generates the above trivial implementations:
proc `*` (x: Dollar, y: int): Dollar {.borrow.}
proc `*` (x: int, y: Dollar): Dollar {.borrow.}
proc `div` (x: Dollar, y: int): Dollar {.borrow.}
The borrow pragma makes the compiler use the same implementation as the proc that deals with the distinct type's base type, so no code is generated.
But it seems all this boilerplate code needs to be repeated for the Euro currency. This can be solved with templates.
template additive(typ: typedesc) =
proc `+` *(x, y: typ): typ {.borrow.}
proc `-` *(x, y: typ): typ {.borrow.}
# unary operators:
proc `+` *(x: typ): typ {.borrow.}
proc `-` *(x: typ): typ {.borrow.}
template multiplicative(typ, base: typedesc) =
proc `*` *(x: typ, y: base): typ {.borrow.}
proc `*` *(x: base, y: typ): typ {.borrow.}
proc `div` *(x: typ, y: base): typ {.borrow.}
proc `mod` *(x: typ, y: base): typ {.borrow.}
template comparable(typ: typedesc) =
proc `<` * (x, y: typ): bool {.borrow.}
proc `<=` * (x, y: typ): bool {.borrow.}
proc `==` * (x, y: typ): bool {.borrow.}
template defineCurrency(typ, base: untyped) =
type
typ* = distinct base
additive(typ)
multiplicative(typ, base)
comparable(typ)
defineCurrency(Dollar, int)
defineCurrency(Euro, int)
The borrow pragma can also be used to annotate the distinct type to allow certain builtin operations to be lifted:
type
Foo = object
a, b: int
s: string
Bar {.borrow: `.`.} = distinct Foo
var bb: ref Bar
new bb
# field access now valid
bb.a = 90
bb.s = "abc"
Currently only the dot accessor can be borrowed in this way.
An SQL statement that is passed from Nim to an SQL database might be modelled as a string. However, using string templates and filling in the values is vulnerable to the famous SQL injection attack:
import strutils
proc query(db: DbHandle, statement: string) = ...
var
username: string
db.query("SELECT FROM users WHERE name = '$1'" % username)
# Horrible security hole, but the compiler does not mind!
This can be avoided by distinguishing strings that contain SQL from strings that don't. Distinct types provide a means to introduce a new string type SQL that is incompatible with string:
type
SQL = distinct string
proc query(db: DbHandle, statement: SQL) = ...
var
username: string
db.query("SELECT FROM users WHERE name = '$1'" % username)
# Error at compile time: `query` expects an SQL string!
It is an essential property of abstract types that they do not imply a subtype relation between the abstract type and its base type. Explicit type conversions from string to SQL are allowed:
import strutils, sequtils
proc properQuote(s: string): SQL =
# quotes a string properly for an SQL statement
return SQL(s)
proc `%` (frmt: SQL, values: openarray[string]): SQL =
# quote each argument:
let v = values.mapIt(SQL, properQuote(it))
# we need a temporary type for the type conversion :-(
type StrSeq = seq[string]
# call strutils.`%`:
result = SQL(string(frmt) % StrSeq(v))
db.query("SELECT FROM users WHERE name = '$1'".SQL % [username])
Now we have compile-time checking against SQL injection attacks. Since "".SQL is transformed to SQL("") no new syntax is needed for nice looking SQL string literals. The hypothetical SQL type actually exists in the library as the TSqlQuery type of modules like db_sqlite.
The void type denotes the absence of any type. Parameters of type void are treated as non-existent, void as a return type means that the procedure does not return a value:
proc nothing(x, y: void): void = echo "ha" nothing() # writes "ha" to stdout
The void type is particularly useful for generic code:
proc callProc[T](p: proc (x: T), x: T) =
when T is void:
p()
else:
p(x)
proc intProc(x: int) = discard
proc emptyProc() = discard
callProc[int](intProc, 12)
callProc[void](emptyProc)
However, a void type cannot be inferred in generic code:
callProc(emptyProc) # Error: type mismatch: got (proc ()) # but expected one of: # callProc(p: proc (T), x: T)
The void type is only valid for parameters and return types; other symbols cannot have the type void.
The auto type can only be used for return types and parameters. For return types it causes the compiler to infer the type from the routine body:
proc returnsInt(): auto = 1984
For parameters it currently creates implicitly generic routines:
proc foo(a, b: auto) = discard
Is the same as:
proc foo[T1, T2](a: T1, b: T2) = discard
However later versions of the language might change this to mean "infer the parameters' types from the body". Then the above foo would be rejected as the parameters' types can not be inferred from an empty discard statement.
The following section defines several relations on types that are needed to describe the type checking done by the compiler.
Nim uses structural type equivalence for most types. Only for objects, enumerations and distinct types name equivalence is used. The following algorithm, in pseudo-code, determines type equality:
proc typeEqualsAux(a, b: PType,
s: var HashSet[(PType, PType)]): bool =
if (a,b) in s: return true
incl(s, (a,b))
if a.kind == b.kind:
case a.kind
of int, intXX, float, floatXX, char, string, cstring, pointer,
bool, nil, void:
# leaf type: kinds identical; nothing more to check
result = true
of ref, ptr, var, set, seq, openarray:
result = typeEqualsAux(a.baseType, b.baseType, s)
of range:
result = typeEqualsAux(a.baseType, b.baseType, s) and
(a.rangeA == b.rangeA) and (a.rangeB == b.rangeB)
of array:
result = typeEqualsAux(a.baseType, b.baseType, s) and
typeEqualsAux(a.indexType, b.indexType, s)
of tuple:
if a.tupleLen == b.tupleLen:
for i in 0..a.tupleLen-1:
if not typeEqualsAux(a[i], b[i], s): return false
result = true
of object, enum, distinct:
result = a == b
of proc:
result = typeEqualsAux(a.parameterTuple, b.parameterTuple, s) and
typeEqualsAux(a.resultType, b.resultType, s) and
a.callingConvention == b.callingConvention
proc typeEquals(a, b: PType): bool =
var s: HashSet[(PType, PType)] = {}
result = typeEqualsAux(a, b, s)
Since types are graphs which can have cycles, the above algorithm needs an auxiliary set s to detect this case.
The following algorithm (in pseudo-code) determines whether two types are equal with no respect to distinct types. For brevity the cycle check with an auxiliary set s is omitted:
proc typeEqualsOrDistinct(a, b: PType): bool =
if a.kind == b.kind:
case a.kind
of int, intXX, float, floatXX, char, string, cstring, pointer,
bool, nil, void:
# leaf type: kinds identical; nothing more to check
result = true
of ref, ptr, var, set, seq, openarray:
result = typeEqualsOrDistinct(a.baseType, b.baseType)
of range:
result = typeEqualsOrDistinct(a.baseType, b.baseType) and
(a.rangeA == b.rangeA) and (a.rangeB == b.rangeB)
of array:
result = typeEqualsOrDistinct(a.baseType, b.baseType) and
typeEqualsOrDistinct(a.indexType, b.indexType)
of tuple:
if a.tupleLen == b.tupleLen:
for i in 0..a.tupleLen-1:
if not typeEqualsOrDistinct(a[i], b[i]): return false
result = true
of distinct:
result = typeEqualsOrDistinct(a.baseType, b.baseType)
of object, enum:
result = a == b
of proc:
result = typeEqualsOrDistinct(a.parameterTuple, b.parameterTuple) and
typeEqualsOrDistinct(a.resultType, b.resultType) and
a.callingConvention == b.callingConvention
elif a.kind == distinct:
result = typeEqualsOrDistinct(a.baseType, b)
elif b.kind == distinct:
result = typeEqualsOrDistinct(a, b.baseType) If object a inherits from b, a is a subtype of b. This subtype relation is extended to the types var, ref, ptr:
proc isSubtype(a, b: PType): bool =
if a.kind == b.kind:
case a.kind
of object:
var aa = a.baseType
while aa != nil and aa != b: aa = aa.baseType
result = aa == b
of var, ref, ptr:
result = isSubtype(a.baseType, b.baseType) Covariance in Nim can be introduced only though pointer-like types such as ptr and ref. Sequence, Array and OpenArray types, instantiated with pointer-like types will be considered covariant if and only if they are also immutable. The introduction of a var modifier or additional ptr or ref indirections would result in invariant treatment of these types.
proc types are currently always invariant, but future versions of Nim may relax this rule.
User-defined generic types may also be covariant with respect to some of their parameters. By default, all generic params are considered invariant, but you may choose the apply the prefix modifier in to a parameter to make it contravariant or out to make it covariant:
type
AnnotatedPtr[out T] =
metadata: MyTypeInfo
p: ref T
RingBuffer[out T] =
startPos: int
data: seq[T]
Action {.importcpp: "std::function<void ('0)>".} [in T] = object
When the designated generic parameter is used to instantiate a pointer-like type as in the case of AnnotatedPtr above, the resulting generic type will also have pointer-like covariance:
type GuiWidget = object of RootObj Button = object of GuiWidget ComboBox = object of GuiWidget var widgetPtr: AnnotatedPtr[GuiWidget] buttonPtr: AnnotatedPtr[Button] ... proc drawWidget[T](x: AnnotatedPtr[GuiWidget]) = ... # you can call procs expecting base types by supplying a derived type drawWidget(buttonPtr) # and you can convert more-specific pointer types to more general ones widgetPtr = buttonPtr
Just like with regular pointers, covariance will be enabled only for immutable values:
proc makeComboBox[T](x: var AnnotatedPtr[GuiWidget]) =
x.p = new(ComboBox)
makeComboBox(buttonPtr) # Error, AnnotatedPtr[Button] cannot be modified
# to point to a ComboBox
On the other hand, in the RingBuffer example above, the designated generic param is used to instantiate the non-pointer seq type, which means that the resulting generic type will have covariance that mimics an array or sequence (i.e. it will be covariant only when instantiated with ptr and ref types):
type
Base = object of RootObj
Derived = object of Base
proc consumeBaseValues(b: RingBuffer[Base]) = ...
var derivedValues: RingBuffer[Derived]
consumeBaseValues(derivedValues) # Error, Base and Derived values may differ
# in size
proc consumeBasePointers(b: RingBuffer[ptr Base]) = ...
var derivedPointers: RingBuffer[ptr Derived]
consumeBaseValues(derivedPointers) # This is legal
Please note that Nim will treat the user-defined pointer-like types as proper alternatives to the built-in pointer types. That is, types such as seq[AnnotatedPtr[T]] or RingBuffer[AnnotatedPtr[T]] will also be considered covariant and you can create new pointer-like types by instantiating other user-defined pointer-like types.
The contravariant parameters introduced with the in modifier are currently useful only when interfacing with imported types having such semantics.
A type a is implicitly convertible to type b iff the following algorithm returns true:
# XXX range types?
proc isImplicitlyConvertible(a, b: PType): bool =
if isSubtype(a, b) or isCovariant(a, b):
return true
case a.kind
of int: result = b in {int8, int16, int32, int64, uint, uint8, uint16,
uint32, uint64, float, float32, float64}
of int8: result = b in {int16, int32, int64, int}
of int16: result = b in {int32, int64, int}
of int32: result = b in {int64, int}
of uint: result = b in {uint32, uint64}
of uint8: result = b in {uint16, uint32, uint64}
of uint16: result = b in {uint32, uint64}
of uint32: result = b in {uint64}
of float: result = b in {float32, float64}
of float32: result = b in {float64, float}
of float64: result = b in {float32, float}
of seq:
result = b == openArray and typeEquals(a.baseType, b.baseType)
of array:
result = b == openArray and typeEquals(a.baseType, b.baseType)
if a.baseType == char and a.indexType.rangeA == 0:
result = b = cstring
of cstring, ptr:
result = b == pointer
of string:
result = b == cstring
A type a is explicitly convertible to type b iff the following algorithm returns true:
proc isIntegralType(t: PType): bool =
result = isOrdinal(t) or t.kind in {float, float32, float64}
proc isExplicitlyConvertible(a, b: PType): bool =
result = false
if isImplicitlyConvertible(a, b): return true
if typeEqualsOrDistinct(a, b): return true
if isIntegralType(a) and isIntegralType(b): return true
if isSubtype(a, b) or isSubtype(b, a): return true
The convertible relation can be relaxed by a user-defined type converter.
converter toInt(x: char): int = result = ord(x) var x: int chr: char = 'a' # implicit conversion magic happens here x = chr echo x # => 97 # you can use the explicit form too x = chr.toInt echo x # => 97
The type conversion T(a) is an L-value if a is an L-value and typeEqualsOrDistinct(T, type(a)) holds.
An expression b can be assigned to an expression a iff a is an l-value and isImplicitlyConvertible(b.typ, a.typ) holds.
In a call p(args) the routine p that matches best is selected. If multiple routines match equally well, the ambiguity is reported at compiletime.
Every arg in args needs to match. There are multiple different categories how an argument can match. Let f be the formal parameter's type and a the type of the argument.
a and f are of the same type.a is an integer literal of value v and f is a signed or unsigned integer type and v is in f's range. Or: a is a floating point literal of value v and f is a floating point type and v is in f's range.f is a generic type and a matches, for instance a is int and f is a generic (constrained) parameter type (like in [T] or [T: int|char].a is a range[T] and T matches f exactly. Or: a is a subtype of f.a is convertible to f and f and a is some integer or floating point type.a is convertible to f, possibly via a user defined converter.These matching categories have a priority: An exact match is better than a literal match and that is better than a generic match etc. In the following count(p, m) counts the number of matches of the matching category m for the routine p.
A routine p matches better than a routine q if the following algorithm returns true:
for each matching category m in ["exact match", "literal match",
"generic match", "subtype match",
"integral match", "conversion match"]:
if count(p, m) > count(q, m): return true
elif count(p, m) == count(q, m):
discard "continue with next category m"
else:
return false
return "ambiguous" Some examples:
proc takesInt(x: int) = echo "int" proc takesInt[T](x: T) = echo "T" proc takesInt(x: int16) = echo "int16" takesInt(4) # "int" var x: int32 takesInt(x) # "T" var y: int16 takesInt(y) # "int16" var z: range[0..4] = 0 takesInt(z) # "T"
If this algorithm returns "ambiguous" further disambiguation is performed: If the argument a matches both the parameter type f of p and g of q via a subtyping relation, the inheritance depth is taken into account:
type A = object of RootObj B = object of A C = object of B proc p(obj: A) = echo "A" proc p(obj: B) = echo "B" var c = C() # not ambiguous, calls 'B', not 'A' since B is a subtype of A # but not vice versa: p(c) proc pp(obj: A, obj2: B) = echo "A B" proc pp(obj: B, obj2: A) = echo "B A" # but this is ambiguous: pp(c, c)
Likewise for generic matches the most specialized generic type (that still matches) is preferred:
proc gen[T](x: ref ref T) = echo "ref ref T" proc gen[T](x: ref T) = echo "ref T" proc gen[T](x: T) = echo "T" var ri: ref int gen(ri) # "ref T"
If the formal parameter f is of type var T in addition to the ordinary type checking, the argument is checked to be an l-value. var T matches better than just T then.
proc sayHi(x: int): string =
# matches a non-var int
result = $x
proc sayHi(x: var int): string =
# matches a var int
result = $(x + 10)
proc sayHello(x: int) =
var m = x # a mutable version of x
echo sayHi(x) # matches the non-var version of sayHi
echo sayHi(m) # matches the var version of sayHi
sayHello(3) # 3
# 13 If the experimental mode is active and no other match is found, the first argument a is dereferenced automatically if it's a pointer type and overloading resolution is tried with a[] instead.
Starting with version 0.14 of the language, Nim supports field as a shortcut for self.field comparable to the this keyword in Java or C++. This feature has to be explicitly enabled via a {.this: self.} statement pragma. This pragma is active for the rest of the module:
type
Parent = object of RootObj
parentField: int
Child = object of Parent
childField: int
{.this: self.}
proc sumFields(self: Child): int =
result = parentField + childField
# is rewritten to:
# result = self.parentField + self.childField
Instead of self any other identifier can be used too, but {.this: self.} will become the default directive for the whole language eventually.
In addition to fields, routine applications are also rewritten, but only if no other interpretation of the call is possible:
proc test(self: Child) = echo childField, " ", sumFields() # is rewritten to: echo self.childField, " ", sumFields(self) # but NOT rewritten to: echo self, self.childField, " ", sumFields(self)
Note: An unresolved expression is an expression for which no symbol lookups and no type checking have been performed.
Since templates and macros that are not declared as immediate participate in overloading resolution it's essential to have a way to pass unresolved expressions to a template or macro. This is what the meta-type untyped accomplishes:
template rem(x: untyped) = discard rem unresolvedExpression(undeclaredIdentifier)
A parameter of type untyped always matches any argument (as long as there is any argument passed to it).
But one has to watch out because other overloads might trigger the argument's resolution:
template rem(x: untyped) = discard proc rem[T](x: T) = discard # undeclared identifier: 'unresolvedExpression' rem unresolvedExpression(undeclaredIdentifier)
untyped and varargs[untyped] are the only metatype that are lazy in this sense, the other metatypes typed and typedesc are not lazy.
See Varargs.
Nim uses the common statement/expression paradigm: Statements do not produce a value in contrast to expressions. However, some expressions are statements.
Statements are separated into simple statements and complex statements. Simple statements are statements that cannot contain other statements like assignments, calls or the return statement; complex statements can contain other statements. To avoid the dangling else problem, complex statements always have to be indented. The details can be found in the grammar.
Statements can also occur in an expression context that looks like (stmt1; stmt2; ...; ex). This is called an statement list expression or (;). The type of (stmt1; stmt2; ...; ex) is the type of ex. All the other statements must be of type void. (One can use discard to produce a void type.) (;) does not introduce a new scope.
Example:
proc p(x, y: int): int = result = x + y discard p(3, 4) # discard the return value of `p`
The discard statement evaluates its expression for side-effects and throws the expression's resulting value away.
Ignoring the return value of a procedure without using a discard statement is a static error.
The return value can be ignored implicitly if the called proc/iterator has been declared with the discardable pragma:
proc p(x, y: int): int {.discardable.} =
result = x + y
p(3, 4) # now valid
An empty discard statement is often used as a null statement:
proc classify(s: string) = case s[0] of SymChars, '_': echo "an identifier" of '0'..'9': echo "a number" else: discard
In a list of statements every expression except the last one needs to have the type void. In addition to this rule an assignment to the builtin result symbol also triggers a mandatory void context for the subsequent expressions:
proc invalid*(): string = result = "foo" "invalid" # Error: value of type 'string' has to be discarded
proc valid*(): string = let x = 317 "valid"
Var statements declare new local and global variables and initialize them. A comma separated list of variables can be used to specify variables of the same type:
var a: int = 0 x, y, z: int
If an initializer is given the type can be omitted: the variable is then of the same type as the initializing expression. Variables are always initialized with a default value if there is no initializing expression. The default value depends on the type and is always a zero in binary.
| Type | default value |
|---|---|
| any integer type | 0 |
| any float | 0.0 |
| char | '\0' |
| bool | false |
| ref or pointer type | nil |
| procedural type | nil |
| sequence | nil (not @[]) |
| string | nil (not "") |
| tuple[x: A, y: B, ...] | (default(A), default(B), ...) (analogous for objects) |
| array[0..., T] | [default(T), ...] |
| range[T] | default(T); this may be out of the valid range |
| T = enum | cast[T](0); this may be an invalid value |
The implicit initialization can be avoided for optimization reasons with the noinit pragma:
var
a {.noInit.}: array [0..1023, char]
If a proc is annotated with the noinit pragma this refers to its implicit result variable:
proc returnUndefinedValue: int {.noinit.} = discard
The implicit initialization can be also prevented by the requiresInit type pragma. The compiler requires an explicit initialization for the object and all of its fields. However it does a control flow analysis to prove the variable has been initialized and does not rely on syntactic properties:
type
MyObject = object {.requiresInit.}
proc p() =
# the following is valid:
var x: MyObject
if someCondition():
x = a()
else:
x = a()
use x A let statement declares new local and global single assignment variables and binds a value to them. The syntax is the same as that of the var statement, except that the keyword var is replaced by the keyword let. Let variables are not l-values and can thus not be passed to var parameters nor can their address be taken. They cannot be assigned new values.
For let variables the same pragmas are available as for ordinary variables.
In a var or let statement tuple unpacking can be performed. The special identifier _ can be used to ignore some parts of the tuple:
proc returnsTuple(): (int, int, int) = (4, 2, 3) let (x, _, z) = returnsTuple()
Constants are symbols which are bound to a value. The constant's value cannot change. The compiler must be able to evaluate the expression in a constant declaration at compile time.
Nim contains a sophisticated compile-time evaluator, so procedures which have no side-effect can be used in constant expressions too:
import strutils
const
constEval = contains("abc", 'b') # computed at compile time!
The rules for compile-time computability are:
p(X) are compile-time computable if p is a proc without side-effects (see the noSideEffect pragma for details) and if X is a (possibly empty) list of compile-time computable arguments.Constants cannot be of type ptr, ref, var or object, nor can they contain such a type.
A static statement/expression can be used to enforce compile time evaluation explicitly. Enforced compile time evaluation can even evaluate code that has side effects:
static: echo "echo at compile time"
It's a static error if the compiler cannot perform the evaluation at compile time.
The current implementation poses some restrictions for compile time evaluation: Code which contains cast or makes use of the foreign function interface cannot be evaluated at compile time. Later versions of Nim will support the FFI at compile time.
Example:
var name = readLine(stdin) if name == "Andreas": echo "What a nice name!" elif name == "": echo "Don't you have a name?" else: echo "Boring name..."
The if statement is a simple way to make a branch in the control flow: The expression after the keyword if is evaluated, if it is true the corresponding statements after the : are executed. Otherwise the expression after the elif is evaluated (if there is an elif branch), if it is true the corresponding statements after the : are executed. This goes on until the last elif. If all conditions fail, the else part is executed. If there is no else part, execution continues with the next statement.
In if statements new scopes begin immediately after the if/elif/else keywords and ends after the corresponding then block. For visualization purposes the scopes have been enclosed in {| |} in the following example:
if {| (let m = input =~ re"(\w+)=\w+"; m.isMatch):
echo "key ", m[0], " value ", m[1] |}
elif {| (let m = input =~ re""; m.isMatch):
echo "new m in this scope" |}
else: {|
echo "m not declared here" |} Example:
case readline(stdin)
of "delete-everything", "restart-computer":
echo "permission denied"
of "go-for-a-walk": echo "please yourself"
else: echo "unknown command"
# indentation of the branches is also allowed; and so is an optional colon
# after the selecting expression:
case readline(stdin):
of "delete-everything", "restart-computer":
echo "permission denied"
of "go-for-a-walk": echo "please yourself"
else: echo "unknown command"
The case statement is similar to the if statement, but it represents a multi-branch selection. The expression after the keyword case is evaluated and if its value is in a slicelist the corresponding statements (after the of keyword) are executed. If the value is not in any given slicelist the else part is executed. If there is no else part and not all possible values that expr can hold occur in a slicelist, a static error occurs. This holds only for expressions of ordinal types. "All possible values" of expr are determined by expr's type. To suppress the static error an else part with an empty discard statement should be used.
For non ordinal types it is not possible to list every possible value and so these always require an else part.
As a special semantic extension, an expression in an of branch of a case statement may evaluate to a set or array constructor; the set or array is then expanded into a list of its elements:
const
SymChars: set[char] = {'a'..'z', 'A'..'Z', '\x80'..'\xFF'}
proc classify(s: string) =
case s[0]
of SymChars, '_': echo "an identifier"
of '0'..'9': echo "a number"
else: echo "other"
# is equivalent to:
proc classify(s: string) =
case s[0]
of 'a'..'z', 'A'..'Z', '\x80'..'\xFF', '_': echo "an identifier"
of '0'..'9': echo "a number"
else: echo "other" Example:
when sizeof(int) == 2: echo "running on a 16 bit system!" elif sizeof(int) == 4: echo "running on a 32 bit system!" elif sizeof(int) == 8: echo "running on a 64 bit system!" else: echo "cannot happen!"
The when statement is almost identical to the if statement with some exceptions:
expr) has to be a constant expression (of type bool).The when statement enables conditional compilation techniques. As a special syntactic extension, the when construct is also available within object definitions.
nimvm is a special symbol, that may be used as expression of when nimvm statement to differentiate execution path between runtime and compile time.
Example:
proc someProcThatMayRunInCompileTime(): bool =
when nimvm:
# This code runs in compile time
result = true
else:
# This code runs in runtime
result = false
const ctValue = someProcThatMayRunInCompileTime()
let rtValue = someProcThatMayRunInCompileTime()
assert(ctValue == true)
assert(rtValue == false)
when nimvm statement must meet the following requirements:
nimvm. More complex expressions are not allowed.elif branches.else branch.when nimvm statement. E.g. it must not define symbols that are used in the following code.Example:
return 40+2
The return statement ends the execution of the current procedure. It is only allowed in procedures. If there is an expr, this is syntactic sugar for:
result = expr return result
return without an expression is a short notation for return result if the proc has a return type. The result variable is always the return value of the procedure. It is automatically declared by the compiler. As all variables, result is initialized to (binary) zero:
proc returnZero(): int = # implicitly returns 0
Example:
yield (1, 2, 3)
The yield statement is used instead of the return statement in iterators. It is only valid in iterators. Execution is returned to the body of the for loop that called the iterator. Yield does not end the iteration process, but execution is passed back to the iterator if the next iteration starts. See the section about iterators (Iterators and the for statement) for further information.
Example:
var found = false
block myblock:
for i in 0..3:
for j in 0..3:
if a[j][i] == 7:
found = true
break myblock # leave the block, in this case both for-loops
echo found
The block statement is a means to group statements to a (named) block. Inside the block, the break statement is allowed to leave the block immediately. A break statement can contain a name of a surrounding block to specify which block is to leave.
Example:
break
The break statement is used to leave a block immediately. If symbol is given, it is the name of the enclosing block that is to leave. If it is absent, the innermost block is left.
Example:
echo "Please tell me your password:" var pw = readLine(stdin) while pw != "12345": echo "Wrong password! Next try:" pw = readLine(stdin)
The while statement is executed until the expr evaluates to false. Endless loops are no error. while statements open an implicit block, so that they can be left with a break statement.
A continue statement leads to the immediate next iteration of the surrounding loop construct. It is only allowed within a loop. A continue statement is syntactic sugar for a nested block:
while expr1: stmt1 continue stmt2
Is equivalent to:
while expr1:
block myBlockName:
stmt1
break myBlockName
stmt2 The direct embedding of assembler code into Nim code is supported by the unsafe asm statement. Identifiers in the assembler code that refer to Nim identifiers shall be enclosed in a special character which can be specified in the statement's pragmas. The default special character is '`':
{.push stackTrace:off.}
proc addInt(a, b: int): int =
# a in eax, and b in edx
asm """
mov eax, `a`
add eax, `b`
jno theEnd
call `raiseOverflow`
theEnd:
"""
{.pop.}
If the GNU assembler is used, quotes and newlines are inserted automatically:
proc addInt(a, b: int): int =
asm """
addl %%ecx, %%eax
jno 1
call `raiseOverflow`
1:
:"=a"(`result`)
:"a"(`a`), "c"(`b`)
"""
Instead of:
proc addInt(a, b: int): int =
asm """
"addl %%ecx, %%eax\n"
"jno 1\n"
"call `raiseOverflow`\n"
"1: \n"
:"=a"(`result`)
:"a"(`a`), "c"(`b`)
""" Warning: The using statement is experimental and has to be explicitly enabled with the experimental pragma or command line option!
The using statement provides syntactic convenience in modules where the same parameter names and types are used over and over. Instead of:
proc foo(c: Context; n: Node) = ... proc bar(c: Context; n: Node, counter: int) = ... proc baz(c: Context; n: Node) = ...
One can tell the compiler about the convention that a parameter of name c should default to type Context, n should default to Node etc.:
{.experimental.}
using
c: Context
n: Node
counter: int
proc foo(c, n) = ...
proc bar(c, n, counter) = ...
proc baz(c, n) = ...
The using section uses the same indentation based grouping syntax as a var or let section.
Note that using is not applied for template since untyped template parameters default to the type system.untyped.
An if expression is almost like an if statement, but it is an expression. Example:
var y = if x > 8: 9 else: 10
An if expression always results in a value, so the else part is required. Elif parts are also allowed.
Just like an if expression, but corresponding to the when statement.
The case expression is again very similar to the case statement:
var favoriteFood = case animal
of "dog": "bones"
of "cat": "mice"
elif animal.endsWith"whale": "plankton"
else:
echo "I'm not sure what to serve, but everybody loves ice cream"
"ice cream"
As seen in the above example, the case expression can also introduce side effects. When multiple statements are given for a branch, Nim will use the last expression as the result value, much like in an expr template.
A table constructor is syntactic sugar for an array constructor:
{"key1": "value1", "key2", "key3": "value2"}
# is the same as:
[("key1", "value1"), ("key2", "value2"), ("key3", "value2")]
The empty table can be written {:} (in contrast to the empty set which is {}) which is thus another way to write as the empty array constructor []. This slightly unusual way of supporting tables has lots of advantages:
{key: val}.newOrderedTable.const section and the compiler can easily put it into the executable's data section just like it can for arrays and the generated data section requires a minimal amount of memory.Syntactically a type conversion is like a procedure call, but a type name replaces the procedure name. A type conversion is always safe in the sense that a failure to convert a type to another results in an exception (if it cannot be determined statically).
Ordinary procs are often preferred over type conversions in Nim: For instance, $ is the toString operator by convention and toFloat and toInt can be used to convert from floating point to integer or vice versa.
Example:
cast[int](x)
Type casts are a crude mechanism to interpret the bit pattern of an expression as if it would be of another type. Type casts are only needed for low-level programming and are inherently unsafe.
The addr operator returns the address of an l-value. If the type of the location is T, the addr operator result is of the type ptr T. An address is always an untraced reference. Taking the address of an object that resides on the stack is unsafe, as the pointer may live longer than the object on the stack and can thus reference a non-existing object. One can get the address of variables, but one can't use it on variables declared through let statements:
let t1 = "Hello" var t2 = t1 t3 : pointer = addr(t2) echo repr(addr(t2)) # --> ref 0x7fff6b71b670 --> 0x10bb81050"Hello" echo cast[ptr string](t3)[] # --> Hello # The following line doesn't compile: echo repr(addr(t1)) # Error: expression has no address
What most programming languages call methods or functions are called procedures in Nim. A procedure declaration consists of an identifier, zero or more formal parameters, a return value type and a block of code. Formal parameters are declared as a list of identifiers separated by either comma or semicolon. A parameter is given a type by : typename. The type applies to all parameters immediately before it, until either the beginning of the parameter list, a semicolon separator or an already typed parameter, is reached. The semicolon can be used to make separation of types and subsequent identifiers more distinct.
# Using only commas proc foo(a, b: int, c, d: bool): int # Using semicolon for visual distinction proc foo(a, b: int; c, d: bool): int # Will fail: a is untyped since ';' stops type propagation. proc foo(a; b: int; c, d: bool): int
A parameter may be declared with a default value which is used if the caller does not provide a value for the argument.
# b is optional with 47 as its default value proc foo(a: int, b: int = 47): int
Parameters can be declared mutable and so allow the proc to modify those arguments, by using the type modifier var.
# "returning" a value to the caller through the 2nd argument # Notice that the function uses no actual return value at all (ie void) proc foo(inp: int, outp: var int) = outp = inp + 47
If the proc declaration has no body, it is a forward declaration. If the proc returns a value, the procedure body can access an implicitly declared variable named result that represents the return value. Procs can be overloaded. The overloading resolution algorithm determines which proc is the best match for the arguments. Example:
proc toLower(c: char): char = # toLower for characters
if c in {'A'..'Z'}:
result = chr(ord(c) + (ord('a') - ord('A')))
else:
result = c
proc toLower(s: string): string = # toLower for strings
result = newString(len(s))
for i in 0..len(s) - 1:
result[i] = toLower(s[i]) # calls toLower for characters; no recursion!
Calling a procedure can be done in many different ways:
proc callme(x, y: int, s: string = "", c: char, b: bool = false) = ... # call with positional arguments # parameter bindings: callme(0, 1, "abc", '\t', true) # (x=0, y=1, s="abc", c='\t', b=true) # call with named and positional arguments: callme(y=1, x=0, "abd", '\t') # (x=0, y=1, s="abd", c='\t', b=false) # call with named arguments (order is not relevant): callme(c='\t', y=1, x=0) # (x=0, y=1, s="", c='\t', b=false) # call as a command statement: no () needed: callme 0, 1, "abc", '\t' # (x=0, y=1, s="abc", c='\t', b=false)
A procedure may call itself recursively.
Operators are procedures with a special operator symbol as identifier:
proc `$` (x: int): string = # converts an integer to a string; this is a prefix operator. result = intToStr(x)
Operators with one parameter are prefix operators, operators with two parameters are infix operators. (However, the parser distinguishes these from the operator's position within an expression.) There is no way to declare postfix operators: all postfix operators are built-in and handled by the grammar explicitly.
Any operator can be called like an ordinary proc with the 'opr' notation. (Thus an operator can have more than two parameters):
proc `*+` (a, b, c: int): int = # Multiply and add result = a * b + c assert `*+`(3, 4, 6) == `*`(a, `+`(b, c))
If a declared symbol is marked with an asterisk it is exported from the current module:
proc exportedEcho*(s: string) = echo s
proc `*`*(a: string; b: int): string =
result = newStringOfCap(a.len * b)
for i in 1..b: result.add a
var exportedVar*: int
const exportedConst* = 78
type
ExportedType* = object
exportedField*: int For object oriented programming, the syntax obj.method(args) can be used instead of method(obj, args). The parentheses can be omitted if there are no remaining arguments: obj.len (instead of len(obj)).
This method call syntax is not restricted to objects, it can be used to supply any type of first argument for procedures:
echo "abc".len # is the same as echo len "abc"
echo "abc".toUpper()
echo {'a', 'b', 'c'}.card
stdout.writeLine("Hallo") # the same as writeLine(stdout, "Hallo")
Another way to look at the method call syntax is that it provides the missing postfix notation.
The method call syntax conflicts with explicit generic instantiations: p[T](x) cannot be written as x.p[T] because x.p[T] is always parsed as (x.p)[T].
Future directions: p[.T.] might be introduced as an alternative syntax to pass explict types to a generic and then x.p[.T.] can be parsed as x.(p[.T.]).
See also: Limitations of the method call syntax.
Nim has no need for get-properties: Ordinary get-procedures that are called with the method call syntax achieve the same. But setting a value is different; for this a special setter syntax is needed:
type
Socket* = ref object of RootObj
FHost: int # cannot be accessed from the outside of the module
# the `F` prefix is a convention to avoid clashes since
# the accessors are named `host`
proc `host=`*(s: var Socket, value: int) {.inline.} =
## setter of hostAddr
s.FHost = value
proc host*(s: Socket): int {.inline.} =
## getter of hostAddr
s.FHost
var s: Socket
new s
s.host = 34 # same as `host=`(s, 34) Routines can be invoked without the () if the call is syntatically a statement. This command invocation syntax also works for expressions, but then only a single argument may follow. This restriction means echo f 1, f 2 is parsed as echo(f(1), f(2)) and not as echo(f(1, f(2))). The method call syntax may be used to provide one more argument in this case:
proc optarg(x: int, y: int = 0): int = x + y proc singlearg(x: int): int = 20*x echo optarg 1, " ", singlearg 2 # prints "1 40" let fail = optarg 1, optarg 8 # Wrong. Too many arguments for a command call let x = optarg(1, optarg 8) # traditional procedure call with 2 arguments let y = 1.optarg optarg 8 # same thing as above, w/o the parenthesis assert x == y
The command invocation syntax also can't have complex expressions as arguments. For example: (anonymous procs), if, case or try. The (do notation) is limited, but usable for a single proc (see the example in the corresponding section). Function calls with no arguments still needs () to distinguish between a call and the function itself as a first class value.
Procedures can appear at the top level in a module as well as inside other scopes, in which case they are called nested procs. A nested proc can access local variables from its enclosing scope and if it does so it becomes a closure. Any captured variables are stored in a hidden additional argument to the closure (its environment) and they are accessed by reference by both the closure and its enclosing scope (i.e. any modifications made to them are visible in both places). The closure environment may be allocated on the heap or on the stack if the compiler determines that this would be safe.
Since closures capture local variables by reference it is often not wanted behavior inside loop bodies. See closureScope for details on how to change this behavior.
Procs can also be treated as expressions, in which case it's allowed to omit the proc's name.
var cities = @["Frankfurt", "Tokyo", "New York", "Kyiv"]
cities.sort(proc (x,y: string): int =
cmp(x.len, y.len))
Procs as expressions can appear both as nested procs and inside top level executable code.
As a special more convenient notation, proc expressions involved in procedure calls can use the do keyword:
sort(cities) do (x,y: string) -> int:
cmp(x.len, y.len)
# Less parenthesis using the method plus command syntax:
cities = cities.map do (x:string) -> string:
"City of " & x
# In macros, the do notation is often used for quasi-quoting
macroResults.add quote do:
if not `ex`:
echo `info`, ": Check failed: ", `expString`
do is written after the parentheses enclosing the regular proc params. The proc expression represented by the do block is appended to them. In calls using the command syntax, the do block will bind to the immediately preceeding expression, transforming it in a call.
do with parentheses is an anonymous proc; however a do without parentheses is just a block of code. The do notation can be used to pass multiple blocks to a macro:
macro performWithUndo(task, undo: untyped) = ... performWithUndo do: # multiple-line block of code # to perform the task do: # code to undo it
The following builtin procs cannot be overloaded for reasons of implementation simplicity (they require specialized semantic checking):
declared, defined, definedInScope, compiles, sizeOf, is, shallowCopy, getAst, astToStr, spawn, procCall
Thus they act more like keywords than like ordinary identifiers; unlike a keyword however, a redefinition may shadow the definition in the system module. From this list the following should not be written in dot notation x.f since x cannot be type checked before it gets passed to f:
declared, defined, definedInScope, compiles, getAst, astToStr
The type of a parameter may be prefixed with the var keyword:
proc divmod(a, b: int; res, remainder: var int) = res = a div b remainder = a mod b var x, y: int divmod(8, 5, x, y) # modifies x and y assert x == 1 assert y == 3
In the example, res and remainder are var parameters. Var parameters can be modified by the procedure and the changes are visible to the caller. The argument passed to a var parameter has to be an l-value. Var parameters are implemented as hidden pointers. The above example is equivalent to:
proc divmod(a, b: int; res, remainder: ptr int) = res[] = a div b remainder[] = a mod b var x, y: int divmod(8, 5, addr(x), addr(y)) assert x == 1 assert y == 3
In the examples, var parameters or pointers are used to provide two return values. This can be done in a cleaner way by returning a tuple:
proc divmod(a, b: int): tuple[res, remainder: int] = (a div b, a mod b) var t = divmod(8, 5) assert t.res == 1 assert t.remainder == 3
One can use tuple unpacking to access the tuple's fields:
var (x, y) = divmod(8, 5) # tuple unpacking assert x == 1 assert y == 3
Note: var parameters are never necessary for efficient parameter passing. Since non-var parameters cannot be modified the compiler is always free to pass arguments by reference if it considers it can speed up execution.
A proc, converter or iterator may return a var type which means that the returned value is an l-value and can be modified by the caller:
var g = 0 proc WriteAccessToG(): var int = result = g WriteAccessToG() = 6 assert g == 6
It is a compile time error if the implicitly introduced pointer could be used to access a location beyond its lifetime:
proc WriteAccessToG(): var int = var g = 0 result = g # Error!
For iterators, a component of a tuple return type can have a var type too:
iterator mpairs(a: var seq[string]): tuple[key: int, val: var string] =
for i in 0..a.high:
yield (i, a[i])
In the standard library every name of a routine that returns a var type starts with the prefix m per convention.
The [] subscript operator for arrays/openarrays/sequences can be overloaded.
Procedures always use static dispatch. Multi-methods use dynamic dispatch. For dynamic dispatch to work on an object it should be a reference type as well.
type
Expression = ref object of RootObj ## abstract base class for an expression
Literal = ref object of Expression
x: int
PlusExpr = ref object of Expression
a, b: Expression
method eval(e: Expression): int {.base.} =
# override this base method
quit "to override!"
method eval(e: Literal): int = return e.x
method eval(e: PlusExpr): int =
# watch out: relies on dynamic binding
result = eval(e.a) + eval(e.b)
proc newLit(x: int): Literal =
new(result)
result.x = x
proc newPlus(a, b: Expression): PlusExpr =
new(result)
result.a = a
result.b = b
echo eval(newPlus(newPlus(newLit(1), newLit(2)), newLit(4)))
In the example the constructors newLit and newPlus are procs because they should use static binding, but eval is a method because it requires dynamic binding.
As can be seen in the example, base methods have to be annotated with the base pragma. The base pragma also acts as a reminder for the programmer that a base method m is used as the foundation to determine all the effects that a call to m might cause.
In a multi-method all parameters that have an object type are used for the dispatching:
type
Thing = ref object of RootObj
Unit = ref object of Thing
x: int
method collide(a, b: Thing) {.base, inline.} =
quit "to override!"
method collide(a: Thing, b: Unit) {.inline.} =
echo "1"
method collide(a: Unit, b: Thing) {.inline.} =
echo "2"
var a, b: Unit
new a
new b
collide(a, b) # output: 2
Invocation of a multi-method cannot be ambiguous: collide 2 is preferred over collide 1 because the resolution works from left to right. In the example Unit, Thing is preferred over Thing, Unit.
Performance note: Nim does not produce a virtual method table, but generates dispatch trees. This avoids the expensive indirect branch for method calls and enables inlining. However, other optimizations like compile time evaluation or dead code elimination do not work with methods.
The for statement is an abstract mechanism to iterate over the elements of a container. It relies on an iterator to do so. Like while statements, for statements open an implicit block, so that they can be left with a break statement.
The for loop declares iteration variables - their scope reaches until the end of the loop body. The iteration variables' types are inferred by the return type of the iterator.
An iterator is similar to a procedure, except that it can be called in the context of a for loop. Iterators provide a way to specify the iteration over an abstract type. A key role in the execution of a for loop plays the yield statement in the called iterator. Whenever a yield statement is reached the data is bound to the for loop variables and control continues in the body of the for loop. The iterator's local variables and execution state are automatically saved between calls. Example:
# this definition exists in the system module
iterator items*(a: string): char {.inline.} =
var i = 0
while i < len(a):
yield a[i]
inc(i)
for ch in items("hello world"): # `ch` is an iteration variable
echo ch
The compiler generates code as if the programmer would have written this:
var i = 0 while i < len(a): var ch = a[i] echo ch inc(i)
If the iterator yields a tuple, there can be as many iteration variables as there are components in the tuple. The i'th iteration variable's type is the type of the i'th component. In other words, implicit tuple unpacking in a for loop context is supported.
If the for loop expression e does not denote an iterator and the for loop has exactly 1 variable, the for loop expression is rewritten to items(e); ie. an items iterator is implicitly invoked:
for x in [1,2,3]: echo x
If the for loop has exactly 2 variables, a pairs iterator is implicitly invoked.
Symbol lookup of the identifiers items/pairs is performed after the rewriting step, so that all overloads of items/pairs are taken into account.
There are 2 kinds of iterators in Nim: inline and closure iterators. An inline iterator is an iterator that's always inlined by the compiler leading to zero overhead for the abstraction, but may result in a heavy increase in code size. Inline iterators are second class citizens; They can be passed as parameters only to other inlining code facilities like templates, macros and other inline iterators.
In contrast to that, a closure iterator can be passed around more freely:
iterator count0(): int {.closure.} =
yield 0
iterator count2(): int {.closure.} =
var x = 1
yield x
inc x
yield x
proc invoke(iter: iterator(): int {.closure.}) =
for x in iter(): echo x
invoke(count0)
invoke(count2)
Closure iterators have other restrictions than inline iterators:
yield in a closure iterator can not occur in a try statement.return is allowed in a closure iterator (but rarely useful) and ends iteration.Iterators that are neither marked {.closure.} nor {.inline.} explicitly default to being inline, but this may change in future versions of the implementation.
The iterator type is always of the calling convention closure implicitly; the following example shows how to use iterators to implement a collaborative tasking system:
# simple tasking:
type
Task = iterator (ticker: int)
iterator a1(ticker: int) {.closure.} =
echo "a1: A"
yield
echo "a1: B"
yield
echo "a1: C"
yield
echo "a1: D"
iterator a2(ticker: int) {.closure.} =
echo "a2: A"
yield
echo "a2: B"
yield
echo "a2: C"
proc runTasks(t: varargs[Task]) =
var ticker = 0
while true:
let x = t[ticker mod t.len]
if finished(x): break
x(ticker)
inc ticker
runTasks(a1, a2)
The builtin system.finished can be used to determine if an iterator has finished its operation; no exception is raised on an attempt to invoke an iterator that has already finished its work.
Note that system.finished is error prone to use because it only returns true one iteration after the iterator has finished:
iterator mycount(a, b: int): int {.closure.} =
var x = a
while x <= b:
yield x
inc x
var c = mycount # instantiate the iterator
while not finished(c):
echo c(1, 3)
# Produces
1
2
3
0
Instead this code has to be used:
var c = mycount # instantiate the iterator while true: let value = c(1, 3) if finished(c): break # and discard 'value'! echo value
It helps to think that the iterator actually returns a pair (value, done) and finished is used to access the hidden done field.
Closure iterators are resumable functions and so one has to provide the arguments to every call. To get around this limitation one can capture parameters of an outer factory proc:
proc mycount(a, b: int): iterator (): int =
result = iterator (): int =
var x = a
while x <= b:
yield x
inc x
let foo = mycount(1, 4)
for f in foo():
echo f A converter is like an ordinary proc except that it enhances the "implicitly convertible" type relation (see Convertible relation):
# bad style ahead: Nim is not C. converter toBool(x: int): bool = x != 0 if 4: echo "compiles"
A converter can also be explicitly invoked for improved readability. Note that implicit converter chaining is not supported: If there is a converter from type A to type B and from type B to type C the implicit conversion from A to C is not provided.
Example:
type # example demonstrating mutually recursive types
Node = ref NodeObj # a traced pointer to a NodeObj
NodeObj = object
le, ri: Node # left and right subtrees
sym: ref Sym # leaves contain a reference to a Sym
Sym = object # a symbol
name: string # the symbol's name
line: int # the line the symbol was declared in
code: Node # the symbol's abstract syntax tree
A type section begins with the type keyword. It contains multiple type definitions. A type definition binds a type to a name. Type definitions can be recursive or even mutually recursive. Mutually recursive types are only possible within a single type section. Nominal types like objects or enums can only be defined in a type section.
Example:
# read the first two lines of a text file that should contain numbers
# and tries to add them
var
f: File
if open(f, "numbers.txt"):
try:
var a = readLine(f)
var b = readLine(f)
echo "sum: " & $(parseInt(a) + parseInt(b))
except OverflowError:
echo "overflow!"
except ValueError:
echo "could not convert string to integer"
except IOError:
echo "IO error!"
except:
echo "Unknown exception!"
finally:
close(f)
The statements after the try are executed in sequential order unless an exception e is raised. If the exception type of e matches any listed in an except clause the corresponding statements are executed. The statements following the except clauses are called exception handlers.
The empty except clause is executed if there is an exception that is not listed otherwise. It is similar to an else clause in if statements.
If there is a finally clause, it is always executed after the exception handlers.
The exception is consumed in an exception handler. However, an exception handler may raise another exception. If the exception is not handled, it is propagated through the call stack. This means that often the rest of the procedure - that is not within a finally clause - is not executed (if an exception occurs).
Try can also be used as an expression; the type of the try branch then needs to fit the types of except branches, but the type of the finally branch always has to be void:
let x = try: parseInt("133a")
except: -1
finally: echo "hi"
To prevent confusing code there is a parsing limitation; if the try follows a ( it has to be written as a one liner:
let x = (try: parseInt("133a") except: -1) Within an except clause, it is possible to use getCurrentException to retrieve the exception that has been raised:
try: # ... except IOError: let e = getCurrentException() # Now use "e"
Note that getCurrentException always returns a ref Exception type. If a variable of the proper type is needed (in the example above, IOError), one must convert it explicitly:
try: # ... except IOError: let e = (ref IOError)(getCurrentException()) # "e" is now of the proper type
However, this is seldom needed. The most common case is to extract an error message from e, and for such situations it is enough to use getCurrentExceptionMsg:
try: # ... except IOError: echo "I/O error: " & getCurrentExceptionMsg()
Instead of a try finally statement a defer statement can be used.
Any statements following the defer in the current block will be considered to be in an implicit try block:
var f = open("numbers.txt")
defer: close(f)
f.write "abc"
f.write "def"
Is rewritten to:
var f = open("numbers.txt")
try:
f.write "abc"
f.write "def"
finally:
close(f)
Top level defer statements are not supported since it's unclear what such a statement should refer to.
Example:
raise newEOS("operating system failed")
Apart from built-in operations like array indexing, memory allocation, etc. the raise statement is the only way to raise an exception.
If no exception name is given, the current exception is re-raised. The ReraiseError exception is raised if there is no exception to re-raise. It follows that the raise statement always raises an exception.
The exception tree is defined in the system module:
Nim supports exception tracking. The raises pragma can be used to explicitly define which exceptions a proc/iterator/method/converter is allowed to raise. The compiler verifies this:
proc p(what: bool) {.raises: [IOError, OSError].} =
if what: raise newException(IOError, "IO")
else: raise newException(OSError, "OS")
An empty raises list (raises: []) means that no exception may be raised:
proc p(): bool {.raises: [].} =
try:
unsafeCall()
result = true
except:
result = false
A raises list can also be attached to a proc type. This affects type compatibility:
type
Callback = proc (s: string) {.raises: [IOError].}
var
c: Callback
proc p(x: string) =
raise newException(OSError, "OS")
c = p # type error
For a routine p the compiler uses inference rules to determine the set of possibly raised exceptions; the algorithm operates on p's call graph:
T is assumed to raise system.Exception (the base type of the exception hierarchy) and thus any exception unless T has an explicit raises list. However if the call is of the form f(...) where f is a parameter of the currently analysed routine it is ignored. The call is optimistically assumed to have no effect. Rule 2 compensates for this case.p's raises list.q which has an unknown body (due to a forward declaration or an importc pragma) is assumed to raise system.Exception unless q has an explicit raises list.m is assumed to raise system.Exception unless m has an explicit raises list.raises list.raises list, the raise and try statements of p are taken into consideration.Rules 1-2 ensure the following works:
proc noRaise(x: proc()) {.raises: [].} =
# unknown call that might raise anything, but valid:
x()
proc doRaise() {.raises: [IOError].} =
raise newException(IOError, "IO")
proc use() {.raises: [].} =
# doesn't compile! Can raise IOError!
noRaise(doRaise)
So in many cases a callback does not cause the compiler to be overly conservative in its effect analysis.
The exception tracking is part of Nim's effect system. Raising an exception is an effect. Other effects can also be defined. A user defined effect is a means to tag a routine and to perform checks against this tag:
type IO = object ## input/output effect
proc readLine(): string {.tags: [IO].}
proc no_IO_please() {.tags: [].} =
# the compiler prevents this:
let x = readLine()
A tag has to be a type name. A tags list - like a raises list - can also be attached to a proc type. This affects type compatibility.
The inference for tag tracking is analogous to the inference for exception tracking.
Note: Read/write tracking is not yet implemented!
The inference for read/write tracking is analogous to the inference for exception tracking.
The effects pragma has been designed to assist the programmer with the effects analysis. It is a statement that makes the compiler output all inferred effects up to the effects's position:
proc p(what: bool) =
if what:
raise newException(IOError, "IO")
{.effects.}
else:
raise newException(OSError, "OS")
The compiler produces a hint message that IOError can be raised. OSError is not listed as it cannot be raised in the branch the effects pragma appears in.
Generics are Nim's means to parametrize procs, iterators or types with type parameters. Depending on context, the brackets are used either to introduce type parameters or to instantiate a generic proc, iterator or type.
The following example shows a generic binary tree can be modelled:
type
BinaryTreeObj[T] = object # BinaryTreeObj is a generic type with
# with generic param ``T``
le, ri: BinaryTree[T] # left and right subtrees; may be nil
data: T # the data stored in a node
BinaryTree[T] = ref BinaryTreeObj[T] # a shorthand for notational convenience
proc newNode[T](data: T): BinaryTree[T] = # constructor for a node
new(result)
result.data = data
proc add[T](root: var BinaryTree[T], n: BinaryTree[T]) =
if root == nil:
root = n
else:
var it = root
while it != nil:
var c = cmp(it.data, n.data) # compare the data items; uses
# the generic ``cmp`` proc that works for
# any type that has a ``==`` and ``<``
# operator
if c < 0:
if it.le == nil:
it.le = n
return
it = it.le
else:
if it.ri == nil:
it.ri = n
return
it = it.ri
iterator inorder[T](root: BinaryTree[T]): T =
# inorder traversal of a binary tree
# recursive iterators are not yet implemented, so this does not work in
# the current compiler!
if root.le != nil: yield inorder(root.le)
yield root.data
if root.ri != nil: yield inorder(root.ri)
var
root: BinaryTree[string] # instantiate a BinaryTree with the type string
add(root, newNode("hallo")) # instantiates generic procs ``newNode`` and
add(root, newNode("world")) # ``add``
for str in inorder(root):
writeLine(stdout, str) The is operator checks for type equivalence at compile time. It is therefore very useful for type specialization within generic code:
type
Table[Key, Value] = object
keys: seq[Key]
values: seq[Value]
when not (Key is string): # nil value for strings used for optimization
deletedKeys: seq[bool] The type (in many other languages called typeof) operator can be used to get the type of an expression:
var x = 0 var y: type(x) # y has type int
If type is used to determine the result type of a proc/iterator/converter call c(X) (where X stands for a possibly empty list of arguments), the interpretation where c is an iterator is preferred over the other interpretations:
import strutils
# strutils contains both a ``split`` proc and iterator, but since an
# an iterator is the preferred interpretation, `y` has the type ``string``:
var y: type("a b c".split) A type class is a special pseudo-type that can be used to match against types in the context of overload resolution or the is operator. Nim supports the following built-in type classes:
| type class | matches |
|---|---|
object |
any object type |
tuple |
any tuple type |
enum |
any enumeration |
proc |
any proc type |
ref |
any ref type |
ptr |
any ptr type |
var |
any var type |
distinct |
any distinct type |
array |
any array type |
set |
any set type |
seq |
any seq type |
auto |
any type |
any |
distinct auto (see below) |
Furthermore, every generic type automatically creates a type class of the same name that will match any instantiation of the generic type.
Type classes can be combined using the standard boolean operators to form more complex type classes:
# create a type class that will match all tuple and object types
type RecordType = tuple or object
proc printFields(rec: RecordType) =
for key, value in fieldPairs(rec):
echo key, " = ", value
Procedures utilizing type classes in such manner are considered to be implicitly generic. They will be instantiated once for each unique combination of param types used within the program.
Nim also allows for type classes and regular types to be specified as type constraints of the generic type parameter:
proc onlyIntOrString[T: int|string](x, y: T) = discard
onlyIntOrString(450, 616) # valid
onlyIntOrString(5.0, 0.0) # type mismatch
onlyIntOrString("xy", 50) # invalid as 'T' cannot be both at the same time
By default, during overload resolution each named type class will bind to exactly one concrete type. We call such type classes bind once types. Here is an example taken directly from the system module to illustrate this:
proc `==`*(x, y: tuple): bool =
## requires `x` and `y` to be of the same tuple type
## generic ``==`` operator for tuples that is lifted from the components
## of `x` and `y`.
result = true
for a, b in fields(x, y):
if a != b: result = false
Alternatively, the distinct type modifier can be applied to the type class to allow each param matching the type class to bind to a different type. Such type classes are called bind many types.
Procs written with the implicitly generic style will often need to refer to the type parameters of the matched generic type. They can be easily accessed using the dot syntax:
type Matrix[T, Rows, Columns] = object ... proc `[]`(m: Matrix, row, col: int): Matrix.T = m.data[col * high(Matrix.Columns) + row]
Alternatively, the type operator can be used over the proc params for similar effect when anonymous or distinct type classes are used.
When a generic type is instantiated with a type class instead of a concrete type, this results in another more specific type class:
seq[ref object] # Any sequence storing references to any object type type T1 = auto proc foo(s: seq[T1], e: T1) # seq[T1] is the same as just `seq`, but T1 will be allowed to bind # to a single type, while the signature is being matched Matrix[Ordinal] # Any Matrix instantiation using integer values
As seen in the previous example, in such instantiations, it's not necessary to supply all type parameters of the generic type, because any missing ones will be inferred to have the equivalent of the any type class and thus they will match anything without discrimination.
Note: Concepts are still in development.
Concepts, also known as "user-defined type classes", are used to specify an arbitrary set of requirements that the matched type must satisfy.
Concepts are written in the following form:
type
Comparable = concept x, y
(x < y) is bool
Stack[T] = concept s, var v
s.pop() is T
v.push(T)
s.len is Ordinal
for value in s:
value is T
The concept is a match if:
The identifiers following the concept keyword represent instances of the currently matched type. You can apply any of the standard type modifiers such as var, ref, ptr and static to denote a more specific type of instance. You can also apply the type modifier to create a named instance of the type itself:
type
MyConcept = concept x, var v, ref r, ptr p, static s, type T
...
Within the concept body, types can appear in positions where ordinary values and parameters are expected. This provides a more convenient way to check for the presence of callable symbols with specific signatures:
type
OutputStream = concept var s
s.write(string)
In order to check for symbols accepting typedesc params, you must prefix the type with an explicit type modifier. The named instance of the type, following the concept keyword is also considered an explicit typedesc value that will be matched only as a type.
type
# Let's imagine a user-defined casting framework with operators
# such as `val.to(string)` and `val.to(JSonValue)`. We can test
# for these with the following concept:
MyCastables = concept x
x.to(type string)
x.to(type JSonValue)
# Let's define a couple of concepts, known from Algebra:
AdditiveMonoid* = concept x, y, type T
x + y is T
T.zero is T # require a proc such as `int.zero` or 'Position.zero'
AdditiveGroup* = concept x, y, type T
x is AdditiveMonoid
-x is T
x - y is T
Please note that the is operator allows one to easily verify the precise type signatures of the required operations, but since type inference and default parameters are still applied in the concept body, it's also possible to describe usage protocols that do not reveal implementation details.
Much like generics, concepts are instantiated exactly once for each tested type and any static code included within the body is executed only once.
By default, the compiler will report the matching errors in concepts only when no other overload can be selected and a normal compilation error is produced. When you need to understand why the compiler is not matching a particular concept and, as a result, a wrong overload is selected, you can apply the explain pragma to either the concept body or a particular call-site.
type
MyConcept {.explain.} = concept ...
overloadedProc(x, y, z) {.explain.}
This will provide Hints in the compiler output either every time the concept is not matched or only on the particular call-site.
The concept types can be parametric just like the regular generic types:
### matrixalgo.nim
import typetraits
type
AnyMatrix*[R, C: static[int]; T] = concept m, var mvar, type M
M.ValueType is T
M.Rows == R
M.Cols == C
m[int, int] is T
mvar[int, int] = T
type TransposedType = stripGenericParams(M)[C, R, T]
AnySquareMatrix*[N: static[int], T] = AnyMatrix[N, N, T]
AnyTransform3D* = AnyMatrix[4, 4, float]
proc transposed*(m: AnyMatrix): m.TransposedType =
for r in 0 .. <m.R:
for c in 0 .. <m.C:
result[r, c] = m[c, r]
proc determinant*(m: AnySquareMatrix): int =
...
proc setPerspectiveProjection*(m: AnyTransform3D) =
...
--------------
### matrix.nim
type
Matrix*[M, N: static[int]; T] = object
data: array[M*N, T]
proc `[]`*(M: Matrix; m, n: int): M.T =
M.data[m * M.N + n]
proc `[]=`*(M: var Matrix; m, n: int; v: M.T) =
M.data[m * M.N + n] = v
# Adapt the Matrix type to the concept's requirements
template Rows*(M: type Matrix): expr = M.M
template Cols*(M: type Matrix): expr = M.N
template ValueType*(M: type Matrix): typedesc = M.T
-------------
### usage.nim
import matrix, matrixalgo
var
m: Matrix[3, 3, int]
projectionMatrix: Matrix[4, 4, float]
echo m.transposed.determinant
setPerspectiveProjection projectionMatrix
When the concept type is matched against a concrete type, the unbound type parameters are inferred from the body of the concept in a way that closely resembles the way generic parameters of callable symbols are inferred on call sites.
Unbound types can appear both as params to calls such as s.push(T) and on the right-hand side of the is operator in cases such as x.pop is T and x.data is seq[T].
Unbound static params will be inferred from expressions involving the == operator and also when types dependent on them are being matched:
type
MatrixReducer[M, N: static[int]; T] = concept x
x.reduce(SquareMatrix[N, T]) is array[M, int]
The Nim compiler includes a simple linear equation solver, allowing it to infer static params in some situations where integer arithmetic is involved.
Just like in regular type classes, Nim discriminates between bind once and bind many types when matching the concept. You can add the distinct modifier to any of the otherwise inferable types to get a type that will be matched without permanently inferring it. This may be useful when you need to match several procs accepting the same wide class of types:
type
Enumerable[T] = concept e
for v in e:
v is T
type
MyConcept = concept o
# this could be inferred to a type such as Enumerable[int]
o.foo is distinct Enumerable
# this could be inferred to a different type such as Enumerable[float]
o.bar is distinct Enumerable
# it's also possible to give an alias name to a `bind many` type class
type Enum = distinct Enumerable
o.baz is Enum
On the other hand, using bind once types allows you to test for equivalent types used in multiple signatures, without actually requiring any concrete types, thus allowing you to encode implementation-defined types:
type
MyConcept = concept x
type T1 = auto
x.foo(T1)
x.bar(T1) # both procs must accept the same type
type T2 = seq[SomeNumber]
x.alpha(T2)
x.omega(T2) # both procs must accept the same type
# and it must be a numeric sequence
As seen in the previous examples, you can refer to generic concepts such as Enumerable[T] just by their short name. Much like the regular generic types, the concept will be automatically instantiated with the bind once auto type in the place of each missing generic param.
Please note that generic concepts such as Enumerable[T] can be matched against concrete types such as string. Nim doesn't require the concept type to have the same number of parameters as the type being matched. If you wish to express a requirement towards the generic parameters of the matched type, you can use a type mapping operator such as genericHead or stripGenericParams within the body of the concept to obtain the uninstantiated version of the type, which you can then try to instantiate in any required way. For example, here is how one might define the classic Functor concept from Haskell and then demonstrate that Nim's Option[T] type is an instance of it:
import future, typetraits
type
Functor[A] = concept f
type MatchedGenericType = genericHead(f.type)
# `f` will be a value of a type such as `Option[T]`
# `MatchedGenericType` will become the `Option` type
f.val is A
# The Functor should provide a way to obtain
# a value stored inside it
type T = auto
map(f, A -> T) is MatchedGenericType[T]
# And it should provide a way to map one instance of
# the Functor to a instance of a different type, given
# a suitable `map` operation for the enclosed values
import options
echo Option[int] is Functor # prints true All top level constants or types appearing within the concept body are accessible through the dot operator in procs where the concept was successfully matched to a concrete type:
type
DateTime = concept t1, t2, type T
const Min = T.MinDate
T.Now is T
t1 < t2 is bool
type TimeSpan = type(t1 - t2)
TimeSpan * int is TimeSpan
TimeSpan + TimeSpan is TimeSpan
t1 + TimeSpan is T
proc eventsJitter(events: Enumerable[DateTime]): float =
var
# this variable will have the inferred TimeSpan type for
# the concrete Date-like value the proc was called with:
averageInterval: DateTime.TimeSpan
deviation: float
... When the matched type within a concept is directly tested against a different concept, we say that the outer concept is a refinement of the inner concept and thus it is more-specific. When both concepts are matched in a call during overload resolution, Nim will assign a higher precedence to the most specific one. As an alternative way of defining concept refinements, you can use the object inheritance syntax involving the of keyword:
type
Graph = concept g, type G of EqualyComparable, Copyable
type
VertexType = G.VertexType
EdgeType = G.EdgeType
VertexType is Copyable
EdgeType is Copyable
var
v: VertexType
e: EdgeType
IncidendeGraph = concept of Graph
# symbols such as variables and types from the refined
# concept are automatically in scope:
g.source(e) is VertexType
g.target(e) is VertexType
g.outgoingEdges(v) is Enumerable[EdgeType]
BidirectionalGraph = concept g, type G
# The following will also turn the concept into a refinement when it
# comes to overload resolution, but it doesn't provide the convenient
# symbol inheritance
g is IncidendeGraph
g.incomingEdges(G.VertexType) is Enumerable[G.EdgeType]
proc f(g: IncidendeGraph)
proc f(g: BidirectionalGraph) # this one will be preferred if we pass a type
# matching the BidirectionalGraph concept Concepts can also be used to convert a whole range of types to a single type or a small set of simpler types. This is achieved with a return statement within the concept body:
type
Stringable = concept x
$x is string
return $x
StringRefValue[CharType] = object
base: ptr CharType
len: int
StringRef = concept x
# the following would be an overloaded proc for cstring, string, seq and
# other user-defined types, returning either a StringRefValue[char] or
# StringRefValue[wchar]
return makeStringRefValue(x)
# the varargs param will here be converted to an array of StringRefValues
# the proc will have only two instantiations for the two character types
proc log(format: static[string], varargs[StringRef])
# this proc will allow char and wchar values to be mixed in
# the same call at the cost of additional instantiations
# the varargs param will be converted to a tuple
proc log(format: static[string], varargs[distinct StringRef]) Concepts allow Nim to define a great number of algorithms, using only static polymorphism and without erasing any type information or sacrificing any execution speed. But when polymorphic collections of objects are required, the user must use one of the provided type erasure techniques - either common base types or VTable types.
VTable types are represented as "fat pointers" storing a reference to an object together with a reference to a table of procs implementing a set of required operations (the so called vtable).
In contrast to other programming languages, the vtable in Nim is stored externally to the object, allowing you to create multiple different vtable views for the same object. Thus, the polymorphism in Nim is unbounded - any type can implement an unlimited number of protocols or interfaces not originally envisioned by the type's author.
Any concept type can be turned into a VTable type by using the vtref or the vtptr compiler magics. Under the hood, these magics generate a converter type class, which converts the regular instances of the matching types to the corresponding VTable type.
type
IntEnumerable = vtref Enumerable[int]
MyObject = object
enumerables: seq[IntEnumerable]
streams: seq[OutputStream.vtref]
proc addEnumerable(o: var MyObject, e: IntEnumerable) =
o.enumerables.add e
proc addStream(o: var MyObject, e: OutputStream.vtref) =
o.streams.add e
The procs that will be included in the vtable are derived from the concept body and include all proc calls for which all param types were specified as concrete types. All such calls should include exactly one param of the type matched against the concept (not necessarily in the first position), which will be considered the value bound to the vtable.
Overloads will be created for all captured procs, accepting the vtable type in the position of the captured underlying object.
Under these rules, it's possible to obtain a vtable type for a concept with unbound type parameters or one instantiated with metatypes (type classes), but it will include a smaller number of captured procs. A completely empty vtable will be reported as an error.
The vtref magic produces types which can be bound to ref types and the vtptr magic produced types bound to ptr types.
The symbol binding rules in generics are slightly subtle: There are "open" and "closed" symbols. A "closed" symbol cannot be re-bound in the instantiation context, an "open" symbol can. Per default overloaded symbols are open and every other symbol is closed.
Open symbols are looked up in two different contexts: Both the context at definition and the context at instantiation are considered:
type
Index = distinct int
proc `==` (a, b: Index): bool {.borrow.}
var a = (0, 0.Index)
var b = (0, 0.Index)
echo a == b # works!
In the example the generic == for tuples (as defined in the system module) uses the == operators of the tuple's components. However, the == for the Index type is defined after the == for tuples; yet the example compiles as the instantiation takes the currently defined symbols into account too.
A symbol can be forced to be open by a mixin declaration:
proc create*[T](): ref T = # there is no overloaded 'init' here, so we need to state that it's an # open symbol explicitly: mixin init new result init result
The bind statement is the counterpart to the mixin statement. It can be used to explicitly declare identifiers that should be bound early (i.e. the identifiers should be looked up in the scope of the template/generic definition):
# Module A var lastId = 0 template genId*: untyped = bind lastId inc(lastId) lastId
# Module B import A echo genId()
But a bind is rarely useful because symbol binding from the definition scope is the default.
A template is a simple form of a macro: It is a simple substitution mechanism that operates on Nim's abstract syntax trees. It is processed in the semantic pass of the compiler.
The syntax to invoke a template is the same as calling a procedure.
Example:
template `!=` (a, b: untyped): untyped = # this definition exists in the System module not (a == b) assert(5 != 6) # the compiler rewrites that to: assert(not (5 == 6))
The !=, >, >=, in, notin, isnot operators are in fact templates:
a > b is transformed into b < a.a in b is transformed into contains(b, a).notin and isnot have the obvious meanings.
The "types" of templates can be the symbols untyped, typed or typedesc (stands for type description). These are "meta types", they can only be used in certain contexts. Real types can be used too; this implies that typed expressions are expected.
An untyped parameter means that symbol lookups and type resolution is not performed before the expression is passed to the template. This means that for example undeclared identifiers can be passed to the template:
template declareInt(x: untyped) = var x: int declareInt(x) # valid x = 3
template declareInt(x: typed) = var x: int declareInt(x) # invalid, because x has not been declared and so has no type
A template where every parameter is untyped is called an immediate template. For historical reasons templates can be explicitly annotated with an immediate pragma and then these templates do not take part in overloading resolution and the parameters' types are ignored by the compiler. Explicit immediate templates are now deprecated.
Note: For historical reasons stmt is an alias for typed and expr an alias for untyped, but new code should use the newer, clearer names.
You can pass a block of statements as a last parameter to a template via a special : syntax:
template withFile(f, fn, mode, actions: untyped): untyped =
var f: File
if open(f, fn, mode):
try:
actions
finally:
close(f)
else:
quit("cannot open: " & fn)
withFile(txt, "ttempl3.txt", fmWrite):
txt.writeLine("line 1")
txt.writeLine("line 2")
In the example the two writeLine statements are bound to the actions parameter.
Usually to pass a block of code to a template the parameter that accepts the block needs to be of type untyped. Because symbol lookups are then delayed until template instantiation time:
template t(body: typed) =
block:
body
t:
var i = 1
echo i
t:
var i = 2 # fails with 'attempt to redeclare i'
echo i
The above code fails with the mysterious error message that i has already been declared. The reason for this is that the var i = ... bodies need to be type-checked before they are passed to the body parameter and type checking in Nim implies symbol lookups. For the symbol lookups to succeed i needs to be added to the current (i.e. outer) scope. After type checking these additions to the symbol table are not rolled back (for better or worse). The same code works with untyped as the passed body is not required to be type-checked:
template t(body: untyped) =
block:
body
t:
var i = 1
echo i
t:
var i = 2 # compiles
echo i In addition to the untyped meta-type that prevents type checking there is also varargs[untyped] so that not even the number of parameters is fixed:
template hideIdentifiers(x: varargs[untyped]) = discard hideIdentifiers(undeclared1, undeclared2)
However, since a template cannot iterate over varargs, this feature is generally much more useful for macros.
Note: For historical reasons varargs[expr] is not equivalent to varargs[untyped].
A template is a hygienic macro and so opens a new scope. Most symbols are bound from the definition scope of the template:
# Module A var lastId = 0 template genId*: untyped = inc(lastId) lastId
# Module B import A echo genId() # Works as 'lastId' has been bound in 'genId's defining scope
As in generics symbol binding can be influenced via mixin or bind statements.
In templates identifiers can be constructed with the backticks notation:
template typedef(name: untyped, typ: typedesc) =
type
`T name`* {.inject.} = typ
`P name`* {.inject.} = ref `T name`
typedef(myint, int)
var x: PMyInt
In the example name is instantiated with myint, so `T name` becomes Tmyint.
A parameter p in a template is even substituted in the expression x.p. Thus template arguments can be used as field names and a global symbol can be shadowed by the same argument name even when fully qualified:
# module 'm'
type
Lev = enum
levA, levB
var abclev = levB
template tstLev(abclev: Lev) =
echo abclev, " ", m.abclev
tstLev(levA)
# produces: 'levA levA'
But the global symbol can properly be captured by a bind statement:
# module 'm'
type
Lev = enum
levA, levB
var abclev = levB
template tstLev(abclev: Lev) =
bind m.abclev
echo abclev, " ", m.abclev
tstLev(levA)
# produces: 'levA levB' Per default templates are hygienic: Local identifiers declared in a template cannot be accessed in the instantiation context:
template newException*(exceptn: typedesc, message: string): untyped =
var
e: ref exceptn # e is implicitly gensym'ed here
new(e)
e.msg = message
e
# so this works:
let e = "message"
raise newException(EIO, e)
Whether a symbol that is declared in a template is exposed to the instantiation scope is controlled by the inject and gensym pragmas: gensym'ed symbols are not exposed but inject'ed are.
The default for symbols of entity type, var, let and const is gensym and for proc, iterator, converter, template, macro is inject. However, if the name of the entity is passed as a template parameter, it is an inject'ed symbol:
template withFile(f, fn, mode: untyped, actions: untyped): untyped =
block:
var f: File # since 'f' is a template param, it's injected implicitly
...
withFile(txt, "ttempl3.txt", fmWrite):
txt.writeLine("line 1")
txt.writeLine("line 2")
The inject and gensym pragmas are second class annotations; they have no semantics outside of a template definition and cannot be abstracted over:
{.pragma myInject: inject.}
template t() =
var x {.myInject.}: int # does NOT work
To get rid of hygiene in templates, one can use the dirty pragma for a template. inject and gensym have no effect in dirty templates.
The expression x in x.f needs to be semantically checked (that means symbol lookup and type checking) before it can be decided that it needs to be rewritten to f(x). Therefore the dot syntax has some limiations when it is used to invoke templates/macros:
template declareVar(name: untyped) =
const name {.inject.} = 45
# Doesn't compile:
unknownIdentifier.declareVar
Another common example is this:
from sequtils import toSeq iterator something: string = yield "Hello" yield "World" var info = toSeq(something())
The problem here is that the compiler already decided that something() as an iterator is not callable in this context before toSeq gets its chance to convert it into a sequence.
A macro is a special kind of low level template. Macros can be used to implement domain specific languages.
While macros enable advanced compile-time code transformations, they cannot change Nim's syntax. However, this is no real restriction because Nim's syntax is flexible enough anyway.
To write macros, one needs to know how the Nim concrete syntax is converted to an abstract syntax tree.
There are two ways to invoke a macro:
macrostmt syntax (statement macros)The following example implements a powerful debug command that accepts a variable number of arguments:
# to work with Nim syntax trees, we need an API that is defined in the
# ``macros`` module:
import macros
macro debug(n: varargs[untyped]): untyped =
# `n` is a Nim AST that contains the whole macro invocation
# this macro returns a list of statements:
result = newNimNode(nnkStmtList, n)
# iterate over any argument that is passed to this macro:
for i in 0..n.len-1:
# add a call to the statement list that writes the expression;
# `toStrLit` converts an AST to its string representation:
add(result, newCall("write", newIdentNode("stdout"), toStrLit(n[i])))
# add a call to the statement list that writes ": "
add(result, newCall("write", newIdentNode("stdout"), newStrLitNode(": ")))
# add a call to the statement list that writes the expressions value:
add(result, newCall("writeLine", newIdentNode("stdout"), n[i]))
var
a: array [0..10, int]
x = "some string"
a[0] = 42
a[1] = 45
debug(a[0], a[1], x)
The macro call expands to:
write(stdout, "a[0]") write(stdout, ": ") writeLine(stdout, a[0]) write(stdout, "a[1]") write(stdout, ": ") writeLine(stdout, a[1]) write(stdout, "x") write(stdout, ": ") writeLine(stdout, x)
Arguments that are passed to a varargs parameter are wrapped in an array constructor expression. This is why debug iterates over all of n's children.
The above debug macro relies on the fact that write, writeLine and stdout are declared in the system module and thus visible in the instantiating context. There is a way to use bound identifiers (aka symbols) instead of using unbound identifiers. The bindSym builtin can be used for that:
import macros
macro debug(n: varargs[typed]): untyped =
result = newNimNode(nnkStmtList, n)
for x in n:
# we can bind symbols in scope via 'bindSym':
add(result, newCall(bindSym"write", bindSym"stdout", toStrLit(x)))
add(result, newCall(bindSym"write", bindSym"stdout", newStrLitNode(": ")))
add(result, newCall(bindSym"writeLine", bindSym"stdout", x))
var
a: array [0..10, int]
x = "some string"
a[0] = 42
a[1] = 45
debug(a[0], a[1], x)
The macro call expands to:
write(stdout, "a[0]") write(stdout, ": ") writeLine(stdout, a[0]) write(stdout, "a[1]") write(stdout, ": ") writeLine(stdout, a[1]) write(stdout, "x") write(stdout, ": ") writeLine(stdout, x)
However, the symbols write, writeLine and stdout are already bound and are not looked up again. As the example shows, bindSym does work with overloaded symbols implicitly.
Statement macros are defined just as expression macros. However, they are invoked by an expression following a colon.
The following example outlines a macro that generates a lexical analyzer from regular expressions:
import macros macro case_token(n: untyped): untyped = # creates a lexical analyzer from regular expressions # ... (implementation is an exercise for the reader :-) discard case_token: # this colon tells the parser it is a macro statement of r"[A-Za-z_]+[A-Za-z_0-9]*": return tkIdentifier of r"0-9+": return tkInteger of r"[\+\-\*\?]+": return tkOperator else: return tkUnknown
Style note: For code readability, it is the best idea to use the least powerful programming construct that still suffices. So the "check list" is:
Whole routines (procs, iterators etc.) can also be passed to a template or a macro via the pragma notation:
template m(s: untyped) = discard
proc p() {.m.} = discard
This is a simple syntactic transformation into:
template m(s: untyped) = discard m: proc p() = discard
Note: static[T] is still in development.
As their name suggests, static parameters must be known at compile-time:
proc precompiledRegex(pattern: static[string]): RegEx =
var res {.global.} = re(pattern)
return res
precompiledRegex("/d+") # Replaces the call with a precompiled
# regex, stored in a global variable
precompiledRegex(paramStr(1)) # Error, command-line options
# are not known at compile-time
For the purposes of code generation, all static params are treated as generic params - the proc will be compiled separately for each unique supplied value (or combination of values).
Static params can also appear in the signatures of generic types:
type
Matrix[M,N: static[int]; T: Number] = array[0..(M*N - 1), T]
# Note how `Number` is just a type constraint here, while
# `static[int]` requires us to supply a compile-time int value
AffineTransform2D[T] = Matrix[3, 3, T]
AffineTransform3D[T] = Matrix[4, 4, T]
var m1: AffineTransform3D[float] # OK
var m2: AffineTransform2D[string] # Error, `string` is not a `Number` typedesc is a special type allowing one to treat types as compile-time values (i.e. if types are compile-time values and all values have a type, then typedesc must be their type).
When used as a regular proc param, typedesc acts as a type class. The proc will be instantiated for each unique type parameter and one can refer to the instantiation type using the param name:
proc new(T: typedesc): ref T = echo "allocating ", T.name new(result) var n = Node.new var tree = new(BinaryTree[int])
When multiple typedesc params are present, they act like a distinct type class (i.e. they will bind freely to different types). To force a bind-once behavior one can use a named alias or an explicit typedesc generic param:
proc acceptOnlyTypePairs[T: typedesc, U: typedesc](A, B: T; C, D: U)
Once bound, typedesc params can appear in the rest of the proc signature:
template declareVariableWithType(T: typedesc, value: T) = var x: T = value declareVariableWithType int, 42
Overload resolution can be further influenced by constraining the set of types that will match the typedesc param:
template maxval(T: typedesc[int]): int = high(int) template maxval(T: typedesc[float]): float = Inf var i = int.maxval var f = float.maxval var s = string.maxval # error, maxval is not implemented for string
The constraint can be a concrete type or a type class.
Note: Dot operators are still experimental and so need to be enabled via {.experimental.}.
Nim offers a special family of dot operators that can be used to intercept and rewrite proc call and field access attempts, referring to previously undeclared symbol names. They can be used to provide a fluent interface to objects lying outside the static confines of the type system such as values from dynamic scripting languages or dynamic file formats such as JSON or XML.
When Nim encounters an expression that cannot be resolved by the standard overload resolution rules, the current scope will be searched for a dot operator that can be matched against a re-written form of the expression, where the unknown field or proc name is converted to an additional static string parameter:
a.b # becomes `.`(a, "b") a.b(c, d) # becomes `.`(a, "b", c, d)
The matched dot operators can be symbols of any callable kind (procs, templates and macros), depending on the desired effect:
proc `.` (js: PJsonNode, field: string): JSON = js[field]
var js = parseJson("{ x: 1, y: 2}")
echo js.x # outputs 1
echo js.y # outputs 2
The following dot operators are available:
This operator will be matched against both field accesses and method calls.
This operator will be matched exclusively against method calls. It has higher precedence than the . operator and this allows one to handle expressions like x.y and x.y() differently if one is interfacing with a scripting language for example.
This operator will be matched against assignments to missing fields.
a.b = c # becomes `.=`(a, "b", c)
There are 3 operations that are bound to a type:
These operations can be overriden instead of overloaded. This means the implementation is automatically lifted to structured types. For instance if type T has an overriden assignment operator = this operator is also used for assignments of the type seq[T]. Since these operations are bound to a type they have to be bound to a nominal type for reasons of simplicity of implementation: This means an overriden deepCopy for ref T is really bound to T and not to ref T. This also means that one cannot override deepCopy for both ptr T and ref T at the same time; instead a helper distinct or object type has to be used for one pointer type.
This operator is the assignment operator. Note that in the contexts result = expr, parameter = defaultValue or for parameter passing no assignment is performed. For a type T that has an overloaded assignment operator var v = T() is rewritten to var v: T; v = T(); in other words var and let contexts do count as assignments.
The assignment operator needs to be attached to an object or distinct type T. Its signature has to be (var T, T). Example:
type
Concrete = object
a, b: string
proc `=`(d: var Concrete; src: Concrete) =
shallowCopy(d.a, src.a)
shallowCopy(d.b, src.b)
echo "Concrete '=' called"
var x, y: array[0..2, Concrete]
var cA, cB: Concrete
var cATup, cBTup: tuple[x: int, ha: Concrete]
x = y
cA = cB
cATup = cBTup A destructor must have a single parameter with a concrete type (the name of a generic type is allowed too). The name of the destructor has to be =destroy.
=destroy(v) will be automatically invoked for every local stack variable v that goes out of scope.
If a structured type features a field with destructable type and the user has not provided an explicit implementation, a destructor for the structured type will be automatically generated. Calls to any base class destructors in both user-defined and generated destructors will be inserted.
A destructor is attached to the type it destructs; expressions of this type can then only be used in destructible contexts and as parameters:
type
MyObj = object
x, y: int
p: pointer
proc `=destroy`(o: var MyObj) =
if o.p != nil: dealloc o.p
proc open: MyObj =
result = MyObj(x: 1, y: 2, p: alloc(3))
proc work(o: MyObj) =
echo o.x
# No destructor invoked here for 'o' as 'o' is a parameter.
proc main() =
# destructor automatically invoked at the end of the scope:
var x = open()
# valid: pass 'x' to some other proc:
work(x)
# Error: usage of a type with a destructor in a non destructible context
echo open()
A destructible context is currently only the following:
expr in var x = expr.expr in let x = expr.expr in return expr.expr in result = expr where result is the special symbol introduced by the compiler.These rules ensure that the construction is tied to a variable and can easily be destructed at its scope exit. Later versions of the language will improve the support of destructors.
Be aware that destructors are not called for objects allocated with new. This may change in future versions of language, but for now the finalizer parameter to new has to be used.
Note: Destructors are still experimental and the spec might change significantly in order to incorporate an escape analysis.
=deepCopy is a builtin that is invoked whenever data is passed to a spawn'ed proc to ensure memory safety. The programmer can override its behaviour for a specific ref or ptr type T. (Later versions of the language may weaken this restriction.)
The signature has to be:
proc `=deepCopy`(x: T): T
This mechanism will be used by most data structures that support shared memory like channels to implement thread safe automatic memory management.
The builtin deepCopy can even clone closures and their environments. See the documentation of spawn for details.
Term rewriting macros are macros or templates that have not only a name but also a pattern that is searched for after the semantic checking phase of the compiler: This means they provide an easy way to enhance the compilation pipeline with user defined optimizations:
template optMul{`*`(a, 2)}(a: int): int = a+a
let x = 3
echo x * 2
The compiler now rewrites x * 2 as x + x. The code inside the curlies is the pattern to match against. The operators *, **, |, ~ have a special meaning in patterns if they are written in infix notation, so to match verbatim against * the ordinary function call syntax needs to be used.
Unfortunately optimizations are hard to get right and even the tiny example is wrong:
template optMul{`*`(a, 2)}(a: int): int = a+a
proc f(): int =
echo "side effect!"
result = 55
echo f() * 2
We cannot duplicate 'a' if it denotes an expression that has a side effect! Fortunately Nim supports side effect analysis:
template optMul{`*`(a, 2)}(a: int{noSideEffect}): int = a+a
proc f(): int =
echo "side effect!"
result = 55
echo f() * 2 # not optimized ;-)
You can make one overload matching with a constraint and one without, and the one with a constraint will have precedence, and so you can handle both cases differently.
So what about 2 * a? We should tell the compiler * is commutative. We cannot really do that however as the following code only swaps arguments blindly:
template mulIsCommutative{`*`(a, b)}(a, b: int): int = b*a
What optimizers really need to do is a canonicalization:
template canonMul{`*`(a, b)}(a: int{lit}, b: int): int = b*a
The int{lit} parameter pattern matches against an expression of type int, but only if it's a literal.
The parameter constraint expression can use the operators | (or), & (and) and ~ (not) and the following predicates:
| Predicate | Meaning |
|---|---|
atom |
The matching node has no children. |
lit |
The matching node is a literal like "abc", 12. |
sym |
The matching node must be a symbol (a bound identifier). |
ident |
The matching node must be an identifier (an unbound identifier). |
call |
The matching AST must be a call/apply expression. |
lvalue |
The matching AST must be an lvalue. |
sideeffect |
The matching AST must have a side effect. |
nosideeffect |
The matching AST must have no side effect. |
param |
A symbol which is a parameter. |
genericparam |
A symbol which is a generic parameter. |
module |
A symbol which is a module. |
type |
A symbol which is a type. |
var |
A symbol which is a variable. |
let |
A symbol which is a let variable. |
const |
A symbol which is a constant. |
result |
The special result variable. |
proc |
A symbol which is a proc. |
method |
A symbol which is a method. |
iterator |
A symbol which is an iterator. |
converter |
A symbol which is a converter. |
macro |
A symbol which is a macro. |
template |
A symbol which is a template. |
field |
A symbol which is a field in a tuple or an object. |
enumfield |
A symbol which is a field in an enumeration. |
forvar |
A for loop variable. |
label |
A label (used in block statements). |
nk* |
The matching AST must have the specified kind. (Example: nkIfStmt denotes an if statement.) |
alias |
States that the marked parameter needs to alias with some other parameter. |
noalias |
States that every other parameter must not alias with the marked parameter. |
Predicates that share their name with a keyword have to be escaped with backticks: `` const . The ``alias and noalias predicates refer not only to the matching AST, but also to every other bound parameter; syntactically they need to occur after the ordinary AST predicates:
template ex{a = b + c}(a: int{noalias}, b, c: int) =
# this transformation is only valid if 'b' and 'c' do not alias 'a':
a = b
inc a, c The operators *, **, |, ~ have a special meaning in patterns if they are written in infix notation.
| operatorThe | operator if used as infix operator creates an ordered choice:
template t{0|1}(): untyped = 3
let a = 1
# outputs 3:
echo a
The matching is performed after the compiler performed some optimizations like constant folding, so the following does not work:
template t{0|1}(): untyped = 3
# outputs 1:
echo 1
The reason is that the compiler already transformed the 1 into "1" for the echo statement. However, a term rewriting macro should not change the semantics anyway. In fact they can be deactivated with the --patterns:off command line option or temporarily with the patterns pragma.
{} operatorA pattern expression can be bound to a pattern parameter via the expr{param} notation:
template t{(0|1|2){x}}(x: untyped): untyped = x+1
let a = 1
# outputs 2:
echo a ~ operatorThe ~ operator is the not operator in patterns:
template t{x = (~x){y} and (~x){z}}(x, y, z: bool) =
x = y
if x: x = z
var
a = false
b = true
c = false
a = b and c
echo a * operatorThe * operator can flatten a nested binary expression like a & b & c to &(a, b, c):
var
calls = 0
proc `&&`(s: varargs[string]): string =
result = s[0]
for i in 1..len(s)-1: result.add s[i]
inc calls
template optConc{ `&&` * a }(a: string): untyped = &&a
let space = " "
echo "my" && (space & "awe" && "some " ) && "concat"
# check that it's been optimized properly:
doAssert calls == 1
The second operator of * must be a parameter; it is used to gather all the arguments. The expression "my" && (space & "awe" && "some " ) && "concat" is passed to optConc in a as a special list (of kind nkArgList) which is flattened into a call expression; thus the invocation of optConc produces:
`&&`("my", space & "awe", "some ", "concat") ** operatorThe ** is much like the * operator, except that it gathers not only all the arguments, but also the matched operators in reverse polish notation:
import macros
type
Matrix = object
dummy: int
proc `*`(a, b: Matrix): Matrix = discard
proc `+`(a, b: Matrix): Matrix = discard
proc `-`(a, b: Matrix): Matrix = discard
proc `$`(a: Matrix): string = result = $a.dummy
proc mat21(): Matrix =
result.dummy = 21
macro optM{ (`+`|`-`|`*`) ** a }(a: Matrix): untyped =
echo treeRepr(a)
result = newCall(bindSym"mat21")
var x, y, z: Matrix
echo x + y * z - x
This passes the expression x + y * z - x to the optM macro as an nnkArgList node containing:
Arglist Sym "x" Sym "y" Sym "z" Sym "*" Sym "+" Sym "x" Sym "-"
(Which is the reverse polish notation of x + y * z - x.)
Parameters in a pattern are type checked in the matching process. If a parameter is of the type varargs it is treated specially and it can match 0 or more arguments in the AST to be matched against:
template optWrite{
write(f, x)
((write|writeLine){w})(f, y)
}(x, y: varargs[untyped], f: File, w: untyped) =
w(f, x, y) The following example shows how some simple partial evaluation can be implemented with term rewriting:
proc p(x, y: int; cond: bool): int =
result = if cond: x + y else: x - y
template optP1{p(x, y, true)}(x, y: untyped): untyped = x + y
template optP2{p(x, y, false)}(x, y: untyped): untyped = x - y The following example shows how some form of hoisting can be implemented:
import pegs
template optPeg{peg(pattern)}(pattern: string{lit}): Peg =
var gl {.global, gensym.} = peg(pattern)
gl
for i in 0 .. 3:
echo match("(a b c)", peg"'(' @ ')'")
echo match("W_HI_Le", peg"\y 'while'")
The optPeg template optimizes the case of a peg constructor with a string literal, so that the pattern will only be parsed once at program startup and stored in a global gl which is then re-used. This optimization is called hoisting because it is comparable to classical loop hoisting.
Parameter constraints can also be used for ordinary routine parameters; these constraints affect ordinary overloading resolution then:
proc optLit(a: string{lit|`const`}) =
echo "string literal"
proc optLit(a: string) =
echo "no string literal"
const
constant = "abc"
var
variable = "xyz"
optLit("literal")
optLit(constant)
optLit(variable)
However, the constraints alias and noalias are not available in ordinary routines.
The call constraint is particularly useful to implement a move optimization for types that have copying semantics:
proc `[]=`*(t: var Table, key: string, val: string) =
## puts a (key, value)-pair into `t`. The semantics of string require
## a copy here:
let idx = findInsertionPosition(key)
t[idx].key = key
t[idx].val = val
proc `[]=`*(t: var Table, key: string{call}, val: string{call}) =
## puts a (key, value)-pair into `t`. Optimized version that knows that
## the strings are unique and thus don't need to be copied:
let idx = findInsertionPosition(key)
shallowCopy t[idx].key, key
shallowCopy t[idx].val, val
var t: Table
# overloading resolution ensures that the optimized []= is called here:
t[f()] = g() Nim supports splitting a program into pieces by a module concept. Each module needs to be in its own file and has its own namespace. Modules enable information hiding and separate compilation. A module may gain access to symbols of another module by the import statement. Recursive module dependencies are allowed, but slightly subtle. Only top-level symbols that are marked with an asterisk (*) are exported. A valid module name can only be a valid Nim identifier (and thus its filename is identifier.nim).
The algorithm for compiling modules is:
This is best illustrated by an example:
# Module A type T1* = int # Module A exports the type ``T1`` import B # the compiler starts parsing B proc main() = var i = p(3) # works because B has been parsed completely here main()
# Module B
import A # A is not parsed here! Only the already known symbols
# of A are imported.
proc p*(x: A.T1): A.T1 =
# this works because the compiler has already
# added T1 to A's interface symbol table
result = x + 1 After the import statement a list of module names can follow or a single module name followed by an except list to prevent some symbols to be imported:
import strutils except `%`, toUpper # doesn't work then: echo "$1" % "abc".toUpper
It is not checked that the except list is really exported from the module. This feature allows to compile against an older version of the module that does not export these identifiers.
The include statement does something fundamentally different than importing a module: it merely includes the contents of a file. The include statement is useful to split up a large module into several files:
include fileA, fileB, fileC
A module alias can be introduced via the as keyword:
import strutils as su, sequtils as qu
echo su.format("$1", "lalelu")
The original module name is then not accessible. The notations path/to/module or path.to.module or "path/to/module" can be used to refer to a module in subdirectories:
import lib.pure.strutils, lib/pure/os, "lib/pure/times"
Note that the module name is still strutils and not lib.pure.strutils and so one cannot do:
import lib.pure.strutils echo lib.pure.strutils
Likewise the following does not make sense as the name is strutils already:
import lib.pure.strutils as strutils
After the from statement a module name follows followed by an import to list the symbols one likes to use without explict full qualification:
from strutils import `%`
echo "$1" % "abc"
# always possible: full qualification:
echo strutils.replace("abc", "a", "z")
It's also possible to use from module import nil if one wants to import the module but wants to enforce fully qualified access to every symbol in module.
An export statement can be used for symbol fowarding so that client modules don't need to import a module's dependencies:
# module B type MyObject* = object
# module A import B export B.MyObject proc `$`*(x: MyObject): string = "my object"
# module C import A # B.MyObject has been imported implicitly here: var x: MyObject echo $x
In module related statements, if any part of the module name / path begins with a number, you may have to quote it in double quotes. In the following example, it would be seen as a literal number '3.0' of type 'float64' if not quoted, if uncertain - quote it:
import "gfx/3d/somemodule"
Identifiers are valid from the point of their declaration until the end of the block in which the declaration occurred. The range where the identifier is known is the scope of the identifier. The exact scope of an identifier depends on the way it was declared.
The scope of a variable declared in the declaration part of a block is valid from the point of declaration until the end of the block. If a block contains a second block, in which the identifier is redeclared, then inside this block, the second declaration will be valid. Upon leaving the inner block, the first declaration is valid again. An identifier cannot be redefined in the same block, except if valid for procedure or iterator overloading purposes.
The field identifiers inside a tuple or object definition are valid in the following places:
All identifiers of a module are valid from the point of declaration until the end of the module. Identifiers from indirectly dependent modules are not available. The system module is automatically imported in every module.
If a module imports an identifier by two different modules, each occurrence of the identifier has to be qualified, unless it is an overloaded procedure or iterator in which case the overloading resolution takes place:
# Module A var x*: string
# Module B var x*: int
# Module C import A, B write(stdout, x) # error: x is ambiguous write(stdout, A.x) # no error: qualifier used var x = 4 write(stdout, x) # not ambiguous: uses the module C's x
The Nim compiler emits different kinds of messages: hint, warning, and error messages. An error message is emitted if the compiler encounters any static error.
Pragmas are Nim's method to give the compiler additional information / commands without introducing a massive number of new keywords. Pragmas are processed on the fly during semantic checking. Pragmas are enclosed in the special {. and .} curly brackets. Pragmas are also often used as a first implementation to play with a language feature before a nicer syntax to access the feature becomes available.
The deprecated pragma is used to mark a symbol as deprecated:
proc p() {.deprecated.}
var x {.deprecated.}: char
It can also be used as a statement, in that case it takes a list of renamings.
type
File = object
Stream = ref object
{.deprecated: [TFile: File, PStream: Stream].} The noSideEffect pragma is used to mark a proc/iterator to have no side effects. This means that the proc/iterator only changes locations that are reachable from its parameters and the return value only depends on the arguments. If none of its parameters have the type var T or ref T or ptr T this means no locations are modified. It is a static error to mark a proc/iterator to have no side effect if the compiler cannot verify this.
As a special semantic rule, the built-in debugEcho pretends to be free of side effects, so that it can be used for debugging routines marked as noSideEffect.
Future directions: func may become a keyword and syntactic sugar for a proc with no side effects:
func `+` (x, y: int): int
The destructor pragma is used to mark a proc to act as a type destructor. Its usage is deprecated, see type bound operations instead.
See type bound operations instead.
The procvar pragma is used to mark a proc that it can be passed to a procedural variable.
The compileTime pragma is used to mark a proc or variable to be used at compile time only. No code will be generated for it. Compile time procs are useful as helpers for macros. Since version 0.12.0 of the language, a proc that uses system.NimNode within its parameter types is implictly declared compileTime:
proc astHelper(n: NimNode): NimNode = result = n
Is the same as:
proc astHelper(n: NimNode): NimNode {.compileTime.} =
result = n The noreturn pragma is used to mark a proc that never returns.
The acyclic pragma can be used for object types to mark them as acyclic even though they seem to be cyclic. This is an optimization for the garbage collector to not consider objects of this type as part of a cycle:
type
Node = ref NodeObj
NodeObj {.acyclic, final.} = object
left, right: Node
data: string
In the example a tree structure is declared with the Node type. Note that the type definition is recursive and the GC has to assume that objects of this type may form a cyclic graph. The acyclic pragma passes the information that this cannot happen to the GC. If the programmer uses the acyclic pragma for data types that are in reality cyclic, the GC may leak memory, but nothing worse happens.
Future directions: The acyclic pragma may become a property of a ref type:
type
Node = acyclic ref NodeObj
NodeObj = object
left, right: Node
data: string The final pragma can be used for an object type to specify that it cannot be inherited from.
The shallow pragma affects the semantics of a type: The compiler is allowed to make a shallow copy. This can cause serious semantic issues and break memory safety! However, it can speed up assignments considerably, because the semantics of Nim require deep copying of sequences and strings. This can be expensive, especially if sequences are used to build a tree structure:
type
NodeKind = enum nkLeaf, nkInner
Node {.final, shallow.} = object
case kind: NodeKind
of nkLeaf:
strVal: string
of nkInner:
children: seq[Node] An object type can be marked with the pure pragma so that its type field which is used for runtime type identification is omitted. This used to be necessary for binary compatibility with other compiled languages.
An enum type can be marked as pure. Then access of its fields always requires full qualification.
A proc can be marked with the asmNoStackFrame pragma to tell the compiler it should not generate a stack frame for the proc. There are also no exit statements like return result; generated and the generated C function is declared as __declspec(naked) or __attribute__((naked)) (depending on the used C compiler).
Note: This pragma should only be used by procs which consist solely of assembler statements.
The error pragma is used to make the compiler output an error message with the given content. Compilation does not necessarily abort after an error though.
The error pragma can also be used to annotate a symbol (like an iterator or proc). The usage of the symbol then triggers a compile-time error. This is especially useful to rule out that some operation is valid due to overloading and type conversions:
## check that underlying int values are compared and not the pointers:
proc `==`(x, y: ptr int): bool {.error.} The fatal pragma is used to make the compiler output an error message with the given content. In contrast to the error pragma, compilation is guaranteed to be aborted by this pragma. Example:
when not defined(objc):
{.fatal: "Compile this program with the objc command!".} The warning pragma is used to make the compiler output a warning message with the given content. Compilation continues after the warning.
The hint pragma is used to make the compiler output a hint message with the given content. Compilation continues after the hint.
The line pragma can be used to affect line information of the annotated statement as seen in stack backtraces:
template myassert*(cond: untyped, msg = "") =
if not cond:
# change run-time line information of the 'raise' statement:
{.line: InstantiationInfo().}:
raise newException(EAssertionFailed, msg)
If the line pragma is used with a parameter, the parameter needs be a tuple[filename: string, line: int]. If it is used without a parameter, system.InstantiationInfo() is used.
The linearScanEnd pragma can be used to tell the compiler how to compile a Nim case statement. Syntactically it has to be used as a statement:
case myInt
of 0:
echo "most common case"
of 1:
{.linearScanEnd.}
echo "second most common case"
of 2: echo "unlikely: use branch table"
else: echo "unlikely too: use branch table for ", myInt
In the example, the case branches 0 and 1 are much more common than the other cases. Therefore the generated assembler code should test for these values first, so that the CPU's branch predictor has a good chance to succeed (avoiding an expensive CPU pipeline stall). The other cases might be put into a jump table for O(1) overhead, but at the cost of a (very likely) pipeline stall.
The linearScanEnd pragma should be put into the last branch that should be tested against via linear scanning. If put into the last branch of the whole case statement, the whole case statement uses linear scanning.
The computedGoto pragma can be used to tell the compiler how to compile a Nim case in a while true statement. Syntactically it has to be used as a statement inside the loop:
type
MyEnum = enum
enumA, enumB, enumC, enumD, enumE
proc vm() =
var instructions: array [0..100, MyEnum]
instructions[2] = enumC
instructions[3] = enumD
instructions[4] = enumA
instructions[5] = enumD
instructions[6] = enumC
instructions[7] = enumA
instructions[8] = enumB
instructions[12] = enumE
var pc = 0
while true:
{.computedGoto.}
let instr = instructions[pc]
case instr
of enumA:
echo "yeah A"
of enumC, enumD:
echo "yeah CD"
of enumB:
echo "yeah B"
of enumE:
break
inc(pc)
vm()
As the example shows computedGoto is mostly useful for interpreters. If the underlying backend (C compiler) does not support the computed goto extension the pragma is simply ignored.
The unroll pragma can be used to tell the compiler that it should unroll a for or while loop for runtime efficiency:
proc searchChar(s: string, c: char): int =
for i in 0 .. s.high:
{.unroll: 4.}
if s[i] == c: return i
result = -1
In the above example, the search loop is unrolled by a factor 4. The unroll factor can be left out too; the compiler then chooses an appropriate unroll factor.
Note: Currently the compiler recognizes but ignores this pragma.
See Ordinary vs immediate templates.
The listed pragmas here can be used to override the code generation options for a proc/method/converter.
The implementation currently provides the following possible options (various others may be added later).
| pragma | allowed values | description |
|---|---|---|
| checks | on|off | Turns the code generation for all runtime checks on or off. |
| boundChecks | on|off | Turns the code generation for array bound checks on or off. |
| overflowChecks | on|off | Turns the code generation for over- or underflow checks on or off. |
| nilChecks | on|off | Turns the code generation for nil pointer checks on or off. |
| assertions | on|off | Turns the code generation for assertions on or off. |
| warnings | on|off | Turns the warning messages of the compiler on or off. |
| hints | on|off | Turns the hint messages of the compiler on or off. |
| optimization | none|speed|size | Optimize the code for speed or size, or disable optimization. |
| patterns | on|off | Turns the term rewriting templates/macros on or off. |
| callconv | cdecl|... | Specifies the default calling convention for all procedures (and procedure types) that follow. |
Example:
{.checks: off, optimization: speed.}
# compile without runtime checks and optimize for speed The push/pop pragmas are very similar to the option directive, but are used to override the settings temporarily. Example:
{.push checks: off.}
# compile this section without runtime checks as it is
# speed critical
# ... some code ...
{.pop.} # restore old settings The register pragma is for variables only. It declares the variable as register, giving the compiler a hint that the variable should be placed in a hardware register for faster access. C compilers usually ignore this though and for good reasons: Often they do a better job without it anyway.
In highly specific cases (a dispatch loop of a bytecode interpreter for example) it may provide benefits, though.
The global pragma can be applied to a variable within a proc to instruct the compiler to store it in a global location and initialize it once at program startup.
proc isHexNumber(s: string): bool =
var pattern {.global.} = re"[0-9a-fA-F]+"
result = s.match(pattern)
When used within a generic proc, a separate unique global variable will be created for each instantiation of the proc. The order of initialization of the created global variables within a module is not defined, but all of them will be initialized after any top-level variables in their originating module and before any variable in a module that imports it.
The deadCodeElim pragma only applies to whole modules: It tells the compiler to activate (or deactivate) dead code elimination for the module the pragma appears in.
The --deadCodeElim:on command line switch has the same effect as marking every module with {.deadCodeElim:on}. However, for some modules such as the GTK wrapper it makes sense to always turn on dead code elimination - no matter if it is globally active or not.
Example:
{.deadCodeElim: on.} The pragma pragma can be used to declare user defined pragmas. This is useful because Nim's templates and macros do not affect pragmas. User defined pragmas are in a different module-wide scope than all other symbols. They cannot be imported from a module.
Example:
when appType == "lib":
{.pragma: rtl, exportc, dynlib, cdecl.}
else:
{.pragma: rtl, importc, dynlib: "client.dll", cdecl.}
proc p*(a, b: int): int {.rtl.} =
result = a+b
In the example a new pragma named rtl is introduced that either imports a symbol from a dynamic library or exports the symbol for dynamic library generation.
Nim generates some warnings and hints ("line too long") that may annoy the user. A mechanism for disabling certain messages is provided: Each hint and warning message contains a symbol in brackets. This is the message's identifier that can be used to enable or disable it:
{.hint[LineTooLong]: off.} # turn off the hint about too long lines
This is often better than disabling all warnings at once.
Nim produces a warning for symbols that are not exported and not used either. The used pragma can be attached to a symbol to suppress this warning. This is particularly useful when the symbol was generated by a macro:
template implementArithOps(T) =
proc echoAdd(a, b: T) {.used.} =
echo a + b
proc echoSub(a, b: T) {.used.} =
echo a - b
# no warning produced for the unused 'echoSub'
implementArithOps(int)
echoAdd 3, 5 The experimental pragma enables experimental language features. Depending on the concrete feature this means that the feature is either considered too unstable for an otherwise stable release or that the future of the feature is uncertain (it may be removed any time).
Example:
{.experimental.}
type
FooId = distinct int
BarId = distinct int
using
foo: FooId
bar: BarId
proc useUsing(bar, foo) =
echo "bar is of type BarId"
echo "foo is of type FooId" This section describes additional pragmas that the current Nim implementation supports but which should not be seen as part of the language specification.
The bitsize pragma is for object field members. It declares the field as a bitfield in C/C++.
type
mybitfield = object
flag {.bitsize:1.}: cuint
generates:
struct mybitfield {
unsigned int flag:1;
}; The volatile pragma is for variables only. It declares the variable as volatile, whatever that means in C/C++ (its semantics are not well defined in C/C++).
Note: This pragma will not exist for the LLVM backend.
The noDecl pragma can be applied to almost any symbol (variable, proc, type, etc.) and is sometimes useful for interoperability with C: It tells Nim that it should not generate a declaration for the symbol in the C code. For example:
var
EACCES {.importc, noDecl.}: cint # pretend EACCES was a variable, as
# Nim does not know its value
However, the header pragma is often the better alternative.
Note: This will not work for the LLVM backend.
The header pragma is very similar to the noDecl pragma: It can be applied to almost any symbol and specifies that it should not be declared and instead the generated code should contain an #include:
type
PFile {.importc: "FILE*", header: "<stdio.h>".} = distinct pointer
# import C's FILE* type; Nim will treat it as a new pointer type
The header pragma always expects a string constant. The string contant contains the header file: As usual for C, a system header file is enclosed in angle brackets: <>. If no angle brackets are given, Nim encloses the header file in "" in the generated C code.
Note: This will not work for the LLVM backend.
The incompleteStruct pragma tells the compiler to not use the underlying C struct in a sizeof expression:
type
DIR* {.importc: "DIR", header: "<dirent.h>",
final, pure, incompleteStruct.} = object The compile pragma can be used to compile and link a C/C++ source file with the project:
{.compile: "myfile.cpp".}
Note: Nim computes a SHA1 checksum and only recompiles the file if it has changed. You can use the -f command line option to force recompilation of the file.
The link pragma can be used to link an additional file with the project:
{.link: "myfile.o".} The passC pragma can be used to pass additional parameters to the C compiler like you would using the commandline switch --passC:
{.passC: "-Wall -Werror".}
Note that you can use gorge from the system module to embed parameters from an external command at compile time:
{.passC: gorge("pkg-config --cflags sdl").} The passL pragma can be used to pass additional parameters to the linker like you would using the commandline switch --passL:
{.passL: "-lSDLmain -lSDL".}
Note that you can use gorge from the system module to embed parameters from an external command at compile time:
{.passL: gorge("pkg-config --libs sdl").} The emit pragma can be used to directly affect the output of the compiler's code generator. So it makes your code unportable to other code generators/backends. Its usage is highly discouraged! However, it can be extremely useful for interfacing with C++ or Objective C code.
Example:
{.emit: """
static int cvariable = 420;
""".}
{.push stackTrace:off.}
proc embedsC() =
var nimVar = 89
# access Nim symbols within an emit section outside of string literals:
{.emit: ["""fprintf(stdout, "%d\n", cvariable + (int)""", nimVar, ");"].}
{.pop.}
embedsC()
For backwards compatibility, if the argument to the emit statement is a single string literal, Nim symbols can be referred to via backticks. This usage is however deprecated.
For a toplevel emit statement the section where in the generated C/C++ file the code should be emitted can be influenced via the prefixes /*TYPESECTION*/ or /*VARSECTION*/ or /*INCLUDESECTION*/:
{.emit: """/*TYPESECTION*/
struct Vector3 {
public:
Vector3(): x(5) {}
Vector3(float x_): x(x_) {}
float x;
};
""".}
type Vector3 {.importcpp: "Vector3", nodecl} = object
x: cfloat
proc constructVector3(a: cfloat): Vector3 {.importcpp: "Vector3(@)", nodecl} Note: c2nim can parse a large subset of C++ and knows about the importcpp pragma pattern language. It is not necessary to know all the details described here.
Similar to the importc pragma for C, the importcpp pragma can be used to import C++ methods or C++ symbols in general. The generated code then uses the C++ method calling syntax: obj->method(arg). In combination with the header and emit pragmas this allows sloppy interfacing with libraries written in C++:
# Horrible example of how to interface with a C++ engine ... ;-)
{.link: "/usr/lib/libIrrlicht.so".}
{.emit: """
using namespace irr;
using namespace core;
using namespace scene;
using namespace video;
using namespace io;
using namespace gui;
""".}
const
irr = "<irrlicht/irrlicht.h>"
type
IrrlichtDeviceObj {.final, header: irr,
importcpp: "IrrlichtDevice".} = object
IrrlichtDevice = ptr IrrlichtDeviceObj
proc createDevice(): IrrlichtDevice {.
header: irr, importcpp: "createDevice(@)".}
proc run(device: IrrlichtDevice): bool {.
header: irr, importcpp: "#.run(@)".}
The compiler needs to be told to generate C++ (command cpp) for this to work. The conditional symbol cpp is defined when the compiler emits C++ code.
The sloppy interfacing example uses .emit to produce using namespace declarations. It is usually much better to instead refer to the imported name via the namespace::identifier notation:
type
IrrlichtDeviceObj {.final, header: irr,
importcpp: "irr::IrrlichtDevice".} = object When importcpp is applied to an enum type the numerical enum values are annotated with the C++ enum type, like in this example: ((TheCppEnum)(3)). (This turned out to be the simplest way to implement it.)
Note that the importcpp variant for procs uses a somewhat cryptic pattern language for maximum flexibility:
# symbol is replaced by the first or next argument.#. indicates that the call should use C++'s dot or arrow notation.@ is replaced by the remaining arguments, separated by commas.For example:
proc cppMethod(this: CppObj, a, b, c: cint) {.importcpp: "#.CppMethod(@)".}
var x: ptr CppObj
cppMethod(x[], 1, 2, 3)
Produces:
x->CppMethod(1, 2, 3)
As a special rule to keep backwards compatibility with older versions of the importcpp pragma, if there is no special pattern character (any of # ' @) at all, C++'s dot or arrow notation is assumed, so the above example can also be written as:
proc cppMethod(this: CppObj, a, b, c: cint) {.importcpp: "CppMethod".}
Note that the pattern language naturally also covers C++'s operator overloading capabilities:
proc vectorAddition(a, b: Vec3): Vec3 {.importcpp: "# + #".}
proc dictLookup(a: Dict, k: Key): Value {.importcpp: "#[#]".}
' followed by an integer i in the range 0..9 is replaced by the i'th parameter type. The 0th position is the result type. This can be used to pass types to C++ function templates. Between the ' and the digit an asterisk can be used to get to the base type of the type. (So it "takes away a star" from the type; T* becomes T.) Two stars can be used to get to the element type of the element type etc.For example:
type Input {.importcpp: "System::Input".} = object
proc getSubsystem*[T](): ptr T {.importcpp: "SystemManager::getSubsystem<'*0>()", nodecl.}
let x: ptr Input = getSubsystem[Input]()
Produces:
x = SystemManager::getSubsystem<System::Input>()
#@ is a special case to support a cnew operation. It is required so that the call expression is inlined directly, without going through a temporary location. This is only required to circumvent a limitation of the current code generator.For example C++'s new operator can be "imported" like this:
proc cnew*[T](x: T): ptr T {.importcpp: "(new '*0#@)", nodecl.}
# constructor of 'Foo':
proc constructFoo(a, b: cint): Foo {.importcpp: "Foo(@)".}
let x = cnew constructFoo(3, 4)
Produces:
x = new Foo(3, 4)
However, depending on the use case new Foo can also be wrapped like this instead:
proc newFoo(a, b: cint): ptr Foo {.importcpp: "new Foo(@)".}
let x = newFoo(3, 4) Sometimes a C++ class has a private copy constructor and so code like Class c = Class(1,2); must not be generated but instead Class c(1,2);. For this purpose the Nim proc that wraps a C++ constructor needs to be annotated with the constructor pragma. This pragma also helps to generate faster C++ code since construction then doesn't invoke the copy constructor:
# a better constructor of 'Foo':
proc constructFoo(a, b: cint): Foo {.importcpp: "Foo(@)", constructor.} Since Nim generates C++ directly, any destructor is called implicitly by the C++ compiler at the scope exits. This means that often one can get away with not wrapping the destructor at all! However when it needs to be invoked explicitly, it needs to be wrapped. But the pattern language already provides everything that is required for that:
proc destroyFoo(this: var Foo) {.importcpp: "#.~Foo()".} Generic importcpp'ed objects are mapped to C++ templates. This means that you can import C++'s templates rather easily without the need for a pattern language for object types:
type
StdMap {.importcpp: "std::map", header: "<map>".} [K, V] = object
proc `[]=`[K, V](this: var StdMap[K, V]; key: K; val: V) {.
importcpp: "#[#] = #", header: "<map>".}
var x: StdMap[cint, cdouble]
x[6] = 91.4
Produces:
std::map<int, double> x; x[6] = 91.4;
' can be used in the supplied pattern to denote the concrete type parameters of the generic type. See the usage of the apostrophe operator in proc patterns for more details.type
VectorIterator {.importcpp: "std::vector<'0>::iterator".} [T] = object
var x: VectorIterator[cint]
Produces:
std::vector<int>::iterator x;
Similar to the importc pragma for C, the importobjc pragma can be used to import Objective C methods. The generated code then uses the Objective C method calling syntax: [obj method param1: arg]. In addition with the header and emit pragmas this allows sloppy interfacing with libraries written in Objective C:
# horrible example of how to interface with GNUStep ...
{.passL: "-lobjc".}
{.emit: """
#include <objc/Object.h>
@interface Greeter:Object
{
}
- (void)greet:(long)x y:(long)dummy;
@end
#include <stdio.h>
@implementation Greeter
- (void)greet:(long)x y:(long)dummy
{
printf("Hello, World!\n");
}
@end
#include <stdlib.h>
""".}
type
Id {.importc: "id", header: "<objc/Object.h>", final.} = distinct int
proc newGreeter: Id {.importobjc: "Greeter new", nodecl.}
proc greet(self: Id, x, y: int) {.importobjc: "greet", nodecl.}
proc free(self: Id) {.importobjc: "free", nodecl.}
var g = newGreeter()
g.greet(12, 34)
g.free()
The compiler needs to be told to generate Objective C (command objc) for this to work. The conditional symbol objc is defined when the compiler emits Objective C code.
The codegenDecl pragma can be used to directly influence Nim's code generator. It receives a format string that determines how the variable or proc is declared in the generated code.
For variables $1 in the format string represents the type of the variable and $2 is the name of the variable.
The following Nim code:
var
a {.codegenDecl: "$# progmem $#".}: int
will generate this C code:
int progmem a
For procedures $1 is the return type of the procedure, $2 is the name of the procedure and $3 is the parameter list.
The following nim code:
proc myinterrupt() {.codegenDecl: "__interrupt $# $#$#".} =
echo "realistic interrupt handler"
will generate this code:
__interrupt void myinterrupt()
The injectStmt pragma can be used to inject a statement before every other statement in the current module. It is only supposed to be used for debugging:
{.injectStmt: gcInvariants().}
# ... complex code here that produces crashes ... The pragmas listed here can be used to optionally accept values from the -d/--define option at compile time.
The implementation currently provides the following possible options (various others may be added later).
| pragma | description |
|---|---|
| intdefine | Reads in a build-time define as an integer |
| strdefine | Reads in a build-time define as a string |
const FooBar {.intdefine.}: int = 5
echo FooBar
nim c -d:FooBar=42 foobar.c
In the above example, providing the -d flag causes the symbol FooBar to be overwritten at compile time, printing out 42. If the -d:FooBar=42 were to be omitted, the default value of 5 would be used.
Nim's FFI (foreign function interface) is extensive and only the parts that scale to other future backends (like the LLVM/JavaScript backends) are documented here.
The importc pragma provides a means to import a proc or a variable from C. The optional argument is a string containing the C identifier. If the argument is missing, the C name is the Nim identifier exactly as spelled:
proc printf(formatstr: cstring) {.header: "<stdio.h>", importc: "printf", varargs.}
Note that this pragma is somewhat of a misnomer: Other backends do provide the same feature under the same name. Also, if one is interfacing with C++ the ImportCpp pragma and interfacing with Objective-C the ImportObjC pragma can be used.
The string literal passed to importc can be a format string:
proc p(s: cstring) {.importc: "prefix$1".}
In the example the external name of p is set to prefixp. Only $1 is available and a literal dollar sign must be written as $$.
The exportc pragma provides a means to export a type, a variable, or a procedure to C. Enums and constants can't be exported. The optional argument is a string containing the C identifier. If the argument is missing, the C name is the Nim identifier exactly as spelled:
proc callme(formatstr: cstring) {.exportc: "callMe", varargs.}
Note that this pragma is somewhat of a misnomer: Other backends do provide the same feature under the same name.
The string literal passed to exportc can be a format string:
proc p(s: string) {.exportc: "prefix$1".} =
echo s
In the example the external name of p is set to prefixp. Only $1 is available and a literal dollar sign must be written as $$.
Like exportc or importc, the extern pragma affects name mangling. The string literal passed to extern can be a format string:
proc p(s: string) {.extern: "prefix$1".} =
echo s
In the example the external name of p is set to prefixp. Only $1 is available and a literal dollar sign must be written as $$.
The bycopy pragma can be applied to an object or tuple type and instructs the compiler to pass the type by value to procs:
type
Vector {.bycopy, pure.} = object
x, y, z: float The byref pragma can be applied to an object or tuple type and instructs the compiler to pass the type by reference (hidden pointer) to procs.
The varargs pragma can be applied to procedures only (and procedure types). It tells Nim that the proc can take a variable number of parameters after the last specified parameter. Nim string values will be converted to C strings automatically:
proc printf(formatstr: cstring) {.nodecl, varargs.}
printf("hallo %s", "world") # "world" will be passed as C string The union pragma can be applied to any object type. It means all of the object's fields are overlaid in memory. This produces a union instead of a struct in the generated C/C++ code. The object declaration then must not use inheritance or any GC'ed memory but this is currently not checked.
Future directions: GC'ed memory should be allowed in unions and the GC should scan unions conservatively.
The packed pragma can be applied to any object type. It ensures that the fields of an object are packed back-to-back in memory. It is useful to store packets or messages from/to network or hardware drivers, and for interoperability with C. Combining packed pragma with inheritance is not defined, and it should not be used with GC'ed memory (ref's).
Future directions: Using GC'ed memory in packed pragma will result in compile-time error. Usage with inheritance should be defined and documented.
The unchecked pragma can be used to mark a named array as unchecked meaning its bounds are not checked. This is often useful to implement customized flexibly sized arrays. Additionally an unchecked array is translated into a C array of undetermined size:
type
ArrayPart{.unchecked.} = array[0, int]
MySeq = object
len, cap: int
data: ArrayPart
Produces roughly this C code:
typedef struct {
NI len;
NI cap;
NI data[];
} MySeq;
The base type of the unchecked array may not contain any GC'ed memory but this is currently not checked.
Future directions: GC'ed memory should be allowed in unchecked arrays and there should be an explicit annotation of how the GC is to determine the runtime size of the array.
With the dynlib pragma a procedure or a variable can be imported from a dynamic library (.dll files for Windows, lib*.so files for UNIX). The non-optional argument has to be the name of the dynamic library:
proc gtk_image_new(): PGtkWidget
{.cdecl, dynlib: "libgtk-x11-2.0.so", importc.}
In general, importing a dynamic library does not require any special linker options or linking with import libraries. This also implies that no devel packages need to be installed.
The dynlib import mechanism supports a versioning scheme:
proc Tcl_Eval(interp: pTcl_Interp, script: cstring): int {.cdecl,
importc, dynlib: "libtcl(|8.5|8.4|8.3).so.(1|0)".}
At runtime the dynamic library is searched for (in this order):
libtcl.so.1 libtcl.so.0 libtcl8.5.so.1 libtcl8.5.so.0 libtcl8.4.so.1 libtcl8.4.so.0 libtcl8.3.so.1 libtcl8.3.so.0
The dynlib pragma supports not only constant strings as argument but also string expressions in general:
import os
proc getDllName: string =
result = "mylib.dll"
if existsFile(result): return
result = "mylib2.dll"
if existsFile(result): return
quit("could not load dynamic library")
proc myImport(s: cstring) {.cdecl, importc, dynlib: getDllName().}
Note: Patterns like libtcl(|8.5|8.4).so are only supported in constant strings, because they are precompiled.
Note: Passing variables to the dynlib pragma will fail at runtime because of order of initialization problems.
Note: A dynlib import can be overriden with the --dynlibOverride:name command line option. The Compiler User Guide contains further information.
With the dynlib pragma a procedure can also be exported to a dynamic library. The pragma then has no argument and has to be used in conjunction with the exportc pragma:
proc exportme(): int {.cdecl, exportc, dynlib.}
This is only useful if the program is compiled as a dynamic library via the --app:lib command line option. This pragma only has an effect for the code generation on the Windows target, so when this pragma is forgotten and the dynamic library is only tested on Mac and/or Linux, there won't be an error. On Windows this pragma adds __declspec(dllexport) to the function declaration.
To enable thread support the --threads:on command line switch needs to be used. The system module then contains several threading primitives. See the threads and channels modules for the low level thread API. There are also high level parallelism constructs available. See spawn for further details.
Nim's memory model for threads is quite different than that of other common programming languages (C, Pascal, Java): Each thread has its own (garbage collected) heap and sharing of memory is restricted to global variables. This helps to prevent race conditions. GC efficiency is improved quite a lot, because the GC never has to stop other threads and see what they reference. Memory allocation requires no lock at all! This design easily scales to massive multicore processors that are becoming the norm.
A proc that is executed as a new thread of execution should be marked by the thread pragma for reasons of readability. The compiler checks for violations of the no heap sharing restriction: This restriction implies that it is invalid to construct a data structure that consists of memory allocated from different (thread local) heaps.
A thread proc is passed to createThread or spawn and invoked indirectly; so the thread pragma implies procvar.
We call a proc p GC safe when it doesn't access any global variable that contains GC'ed memory (string, seq, ref or a closure) either directly or indirectly through a call to a GC unsafe proc.
The gcsafe annotation can be used to mark a proc to be gcsafe, otherwise this property is inferred by the compiler. Note that noSideEffect implies gcsafe. The only way to create a thread is via spawn or createThread. spawn is usually the preferable method. Either way the invoked proc must not use var parameters nor must any of its parameters contain a ref or closure type. This enforces the no heap sharing restriction.
Routines that are imported from C are always assumed to be gcsafe. To disable the GC-safety checking the --threadAnalysis:off command line switch can be used. This is a temporary workaround to ease the porting effort from old code to the new threading model.
To override the compiler's gcsafety analysis a {.gcsafe.} pragma block can be used:
var
someGlobal: string = "some string here"
perThread {.threadvar.}: string
proc setPerThread() =
{.gcsafe.}:
deepCopy(perThread, someGlobal)
Future directions:
A global variable can be marked with the threadvar pragma; it is a thread-local variable then:
var checkpoints* {.threadvar.}: seq[string]
Due to implementation restrictions thread local variables cannot be initialized within the var section. (Every thread local variable needs to be replicated at thread creation.)
The interaction between threads and exceptions is simple: A handled exception in one thread cannot affect any other thread. However, an unhandled exception in one thread terminates the whole process!
Nim has two flavors of parallelism:
parallel statement.spawn statement.Nim has a builtin thread pool that can be used for CPU intensive tasks. For IO intensive tasks the async and await features should be used instead. Both parallel and spawn need the threadpool module to work.
Somewhat confusingly, spawn is also used in the parallel statement with slightly different semantics. spawn always takes a call expression of the form f(a, ...). Let T be f's return type. If T is void then spawn's return type is also void otherwise it is FlowVar[T].
Within a parallel section sometimes the FlowVar[T] is eliminated to T. This happens when T does not contain any GC'ed memory. The compiler can ensure the location in location = spawn f(...) is not read prematurely within a parallel section and so there is no need for the overhead of an indirection via FlowVar[T] to ensure correctness.
Note: Currently exceptions are not propagated between spawn'ed tasks!
spawn can be used to pass a task to the thread pool:
import threadpool
proc processLine(line: string) =
discard "do some heavy lifting here"
for x in lines("myinput.txt"):
spawn processLine(x)
sync()
For reasons of type safety and implementation simplicity the expression that spawn takes is restricted:
f(a, ...).f must be gcsafe.f must not have the calling convention closure.f's parameters may not be of type var. This means one has to use raw ptr's for data passing reminding the programmer to be careful.ref parameters are deeply copied which is a subtle semantic change and can cause performance problems but ensures memory safety. This deep copy is performed via system.deepCopy and so can be overridden.f and the caller a global TChannel needs to be used. However, since spawn can return a result, often no further communication is required.spawn executes the passed expression on the thread pool and returns a data flow variable FlowVar[T] that can be read from. The reading with the ^ operator is blocking. However, one can use awaitAny to wait on multiple flow variables at the same time:
import threadpool, ...
# wait until 2 out of 3 servers received the update:
proc main =
var responses = newSeq[FlowVarBase](3)
for i in 0..2:
responses[i] = spawn tellServer(Update, "key", "value")
var index = awaitAny(responses)
assert index >= 0
responses.del(index)
discard awaitAny(responses)
Data flow variables ensure that no data races are possible. Due to technical limitations not every type T is possible in a data flow variable: T has to be of the type ref, string, seq or of a type that doesn't contain a type that is garbage collected. This restriction is not hard to work-around in practice.
Example:
# Compute PI in an inefficient way
import strutils, math, threadpool
proc term(k: float): float = 4 * math.pow(-1, k) / (2*k + 1)
proc pi(n: int): float =
var ch = newSeq[float](n+1)
parallel:
for k in 0..ch.high:
ch[k] = spawn term(float(k))
for k in 0..ch.high:
result += ch[k]
echo formatFloat(pi(5000))
The parallel statement is the preferred mechanism to introduce parallelism in a Nim program. A subset of the Nim language is valid within a parallel section. This subset is checked to be free of data races at compile time. A sophisticated disjoint checker ensures that no data races are possible even though shared memory is extensively supported!
The subset is in fact the full language with the following restrictions / changes:
spawn within a parallel section has special semantics.a[i] and a[i..j] and dest where dest is part of the pattern dest = spawn f(...) has to be provably disjoint. This is called the disjoint check.loc that is used in a spawned proc (spawn f(loc)) has to be immutable for the duration of the parallel section. This is called the immutability check. Currently it is not specified what exactly "complex location" means. We need to make this an optimization!parallel section.Apart from spawn and parallel Nim also provides all the common low level concurrency mechanisms like locks, atomic intristics or condition variables.
Nim significantly improves on the safety of these features via additional pragmas:
Object fields and global variables can be annotated via a guard pragma:
var glock: TLock
var gdata {.guard: glock.}: int
The compiler then ensures that every access of gdata is within a locks section:
proc invalid =
# invalid: unguarded access:
echo gdata
proc valid =
# valid access:
{.locks: [glock].}:
echo gdata
Top level accesses to gdata are always allowed so that it can be initialized conveniently. It is assumed (but not enforced) that every top level statement is executed before any concurrent action happens.
The locks section deliberately looks ugly because it has no runtime semantics and should not be used directly! It should only be used in templates that also implement some form of locking at runtime:
template lock(a: TLock; body: untyped) =
pthread_mutex_lock(a)
{.locks: [a].}:
try:
body
finally:
pthread_mutex_unlock(a)
The guard does not need to be of any particular type. It is flexible enough to model low level lockfree mechanisms:
var dummyLock {.compileTime.}: int
var atomicCounter {.guard: dummyLock.}: int
template atomicRead(x): untyped =
{.locks: [dummyLock].}:
memoryReadBarrier()
x
echo atomicRead(atomicCounter)
The locks pragma takes a list of lock expressions locks: [a, b, ...] in order to support multi lock statements. Why these are essential is explained in the lock levels section.
The guard annotation can also be used to protect fields within an object. The guard then needs to be another field within the same object or a global variable.
Since objects can reside on the heap or on the stack this greatly enhances the expressivity of the language:
type
ProtectedCounter = object
v {.guard: L.}: int
L: TLock
proc incCounters(counters: var openArray[ProtectedCounter]) =
for i in 0..counters.high:
lock counters[i].L:
inc counters[i].v
The access to field x.v is allowed since its guard x.L is active. After template expansion, this amounts to:
proc incCounters(counters: var openArray[ProtectedCounter]) =
for i in 0..counters.high:
pthread_mutex_lock(counters[i].L)
{.locks: [counters[i].L].}:
try:
inc counters[i].v
finally:
pthread_mutex_unlock(counters[i].L)
There is an analysis that checks that counters[i].L is the lock that corresponds to the protected location counters[i].v. This analysis is called path analysis because it deals with paths to locations like obj.field[i].fieldB[j].
The path analysis is currently unsound, but that doesn't make it useless. Two paths are considered equivalent if they are syntactically the same.
This means the following compiles (for now) even though it really should not:
{.locks: [a[i].L].}:
inc i
access a[i].v Lock levels are used to enforce a global locking order in order to prevent deadlocks at compile-time. A lock level is an constant integer in the range 0..1_000. Lock level 0 means that no lock is acquired at all.
If a section of code holds a lock of level M than it can also acquire any lock of level N < M. Another lock of level M cannot be acquired. Locks of the same level can only be acquired at the same time within a single locks section:
var a, b: TLock[2]
var x: TLock[1]
# invalid locking order: TLock[1] cannot be acquired before TLock[2]:
{.locks: [x].}:
{.locks: [a].}:
...
# valid locking order: TLock[2] acquired before TLock[1]:
{.locks: [a].}:
{.locks: [x].}:
...
# invalid locking order: TLock[2] acquired before TLock[2]:
{.locks: [a].}:
{.locks: [b].}:
...
# valid locking order, locks of the same level acquired at the same time:
{.locks: [a, b].}:
...
Here is how a typical multilock statement can be implemented in Nim. Note how the runtime check is required to ensure a global ordering for two locks a and b of the same lock level:
template multilock(a, b: ptr TLock; body: untyped) =
if cast[ByteAddress](a) < cast[ByteAddress](b):
pthread_mutex_lock(a)
pthread_mutex_lock(b)
else:
pthread_mutex_lock(b)
pthread_mutex_lock(a)
{.locks: [a, b].}:
try:
body
finally:
pthread_mutex_unlock(a)
pthread_mutex_unlock(b)
Whole routines can also be annotated with a locks pragma that takes a lock level. This then means that the routine may acquire locks of up to this level. This is essential so that procs can be called within a locks section:
proc p() {.locks: 3.} = discard
var a: TLock[4]
{.locks: [a].}:
# p's locklevel (3) is strictly less than a's (4) so the call is allowed:
p()
As usual locks is an inferred effect and there is a subtype relation: proc () {.locks: N.} is a subtype of proc () {.locks: M.} iff (M <= N).
The locks pragma can also take the special value "unknown". This is useful in the context of dynamic method dispatching. In the following example, the compiler can infer a lock level of 0 for the base case. However, one of the overloaded methods calls a procvar which is potentially locking. Thus, the lock level of calling g.testMethod cannot be inferred statically, leading to compiler warnings. By using {.locks: "unknown".}, the base method can be marked explicitly as having unknown lock level as well:
type SomeBase* = ref object of RootObj
type SomeDerived* = ref object of SomeBase
memberProc*: proc ()
method testMethod(g: SomeBase) {.base, locks: "unknown".} = discard
method testMethod(g: SomeDerived) =
if g.memberProc != nil:
g.memberProc() The Nim compiler and most parts of the standard library support a taint mode. Input strings are declared with the TaintedString string type declared in the system module.
If the taint mode is turned on (via the --taintMode:on command line option) it is a distinct string type which helps to detect input validation errors:
echo "your name: " var name: TaintedString = stdin.readline # it is safe here to output the name without any input validation, so # we simply convert `name` to string to make the compiler happy: echo "hi, ", name.string
If the taint mode is turned off, TaintedString is simply an alias for string.
© 2006–2017 Andreas Rumpf
Licensed under the MIT License.
https://nim-lang.org/docs/manual.html