Cubiml is a simple ML-like programming language with subtyping and full type inference. You can try it out online in your browser here. Cubiml uses cubic biunification, a faster and simpler type inference algorithm based on Algebraic Subtyping. Cubiml is not intended to be used in its own right, but rather to serve as a tutorial for implementing cubic biunification, and therefore has a deliberately minimal feature set.

Usage

You can try out cubiml online in your browser at https://storyyeller.github.io/cubiml-demo/demo.html.

A quick tour of cubiml

Cubiml syntax is mostly a subset of Ocaml syntax.

Conditionals

In cubiml if is an expression, not a statement. The general form is if <expr> then <expr> else <expr> where the <expr>s are sub-expressions. The first expression is evaluated, and depending on whether it is true or false, one of the other two subexpressions is evaluated, and the result of the if expression is that expression's value. For example, evaluating if false then "Hello" else "World" would result in "World". You can think of this as similar to the ternary operator (a ? b : c) present in some programming languages.

Records and fields

Records are a grouping of zero or more named values similar to "objects" or "structs" in other programming languages and are defined via {name1=val1; name2=val2; ...}. You can access the value of a field using the usual .name syntax. For example {a=true; b="Hello"; c={}}.b would evaluate to "Hello".

There is a special shorthand syntax for fields with the same name as their value - {a; b; c=4} is equivalent to {a=a; b=b; c=4}.

Unlike in Ocaml, records are structurally typed. In fact, Cubiml has only structural types, with no named types.

Functions

In cubiml, all functions are required to take exactly one argument for simplicity. They are defined by fun <arg> -> <expr>. For example, a function which returns its argument unchanged could be written as fun x -> x. Functions are called by simply suffixing an argument, i.e. writing a b where a is the function to be called and b is the argument. For example

(fun b -> if b then "Hello" else "World") true

would evaluate to "Hello", while

(fun x -> x.foo) {bar=false; foo="Bob"}

would evaluate to "Bob".

You can work around the one-argument limitation and simulate multiple function arguments by passing in a record. For example, instead of

function sum(a, b) {
    return a + b;
}

sum(7, 8)

in cubiml, you can do

let sum = fun args -> args.a + args.b;

sum {a=7; b=8}

In fact, you can simplify this further using destructuring patterns:

let sum = fun {a; b} -> a + b;

sum {a=7; b=8}

Unlike in Ocaml, a b c is parsed as a (b c) rather than (a b) c. Since all functions and variants have exactly one argument in Cubiml, this behavior is much more convenient than the Ocaml behavior.

Let bindings

No programming language would be complete without the ability to bind values to a variable name for later reference. In cubiml, this is done slightly differently than you may be used to. The general format is let <name> = <expr1> in <expr2>, where the variable <name> is visible in the body of <expr2>. The entire thing is an expression which evaluates to whatever <expr2> evaluates to.

For example,

let x = 7 * 8 in {foo=x; bar=x}     

would evaluate to {foo=56; bar=56}.

Let bindings can of course be nested like any other expression. For example,

let x = 3 + 4 in
    let y = x * 2 in
        {x=x; y=y}

would evaluate to {x=7; y=14}.

This provides an equivalent to traditional imperative style code like the following that you might see in other languages

let x = 3 + 4;
let y = x * 2;
return {x=x, y=y};

Unlike in OCaml, you can also use semicolons rather than "in". let x = 4; x + x and let x = 4 in x + x are exactly equivalent except that "in" has higher precendence than ";". In most cases, you will need to wrap your code in parenthesis or begin/end when using semicolons.

Therefore, the previous example could also be written using semicolons like this:

begin
    let x = 3 + 4;
    let y = x * 2;
    {x=x; y=y}
end

Note that the above format produces an expression which can be used in any context where an expression is expected. Cubiml follows the ML philosophy that (nearly) everything is an expression, even conditionals, function definitions, variable bindings, and other things that are statements in some languages.

However, this style is inconvenient when interactively entering code into a REPL (Read Evaluate Print Loop), because it requires you to input the entire program at once. To handle this, cubiml allows an alternate non-expression format at the top level of your code. At the top level, you can omit the in <expr> part, in which case the let statement produces a global binding which is visible to all subsequent code. For example, here is a possible session of code entered into the cubiml REPL.

>> let x = {}

{}

>> let y = {x=x; other=false}

{x={}; other=false}

>> let z = {other=y.other; foo={y=y; x=x}}

{other=false; foo={y={x={}; other=false}; x=...}}

You can also separate multiple top level definitions with semicolons if you are entering multiple items at once.

>> let a = z.foo.y; let b = true

true

>> if b then y else x

{x={}; other=false}

You can also use destructuring patterns in let assignments. For example, let {a; b=c} = {a=3; b=4}; results in two variables, a set to 3 and c set to 4.

Recursive let bindings

Sometimes, one wishes to have functions that call themselves recursively. Unfortunately, this is impossible with the above constructs since plain let-expressions can only refer to variables that were already defined.

In order to support recursion, cubiml offers recursive let expressions which are defined via let rec and allow the definition of the variable to refer to itself. For example, you could define a recursive fibonacci function as follows:

let rec fib = fun x ->
    if x <= 1 then 
        1
    else
        fib(x - 1) + fib(x - 2)

In order to avoid code referring to variables that don't exist yet, the right hand side of let rec variable definitions is restricted to be a function definition.

Mutual recursion

The above syntax works for a single function that refers to itself, but in some cases, you may want to have multiple functions that each refer to each other. Unlike in the case with let, simply nesting let recs won't work. Therefore, let rec allows multiple variable bindings, separated by and. For example, you can define mutually recursive even and odd functions as follows:

let rec even = fun x -> if x == 0 then true else odd(x - 1)
    and odd = fun x -> if x == 0 then false else even(x - 1)

Case types and matching

Sometimes you need to make different decisions based on runtime data in a type safe manner. Cubiml supports this via case types, also known as sum types or enums. Basically, the way they work is that you can wrap a value with a tag, and then later match against it. The match expression has branches that execute different code depending on the runtime value of the tag. Crucially, each match branch has access to the static type of the original wrapped value for that specific tag. You can think of it like a simpler, statically checked version of Java's visitor pattern or a giant switch statement on an union in C.

To wrap a value, prefix it with a grave (`) character and an uppercase Tag. E.g. `Foo {hello="Hello"}

You can later match on it like follows

let calculate_area = fun shape ->
    match shape with
        | `Circle v -> v.rad *. v.rad *. 3.1415926
        | `Rectangle v -> v.length *. v.height;

calculate_area `Circle {rad=6.7}
calculate_area `Rectangle {height=1.1; length=2.2}

Notice that within the Circle branch, the code can access the rad field, and within the Rectangle branch, it can access the length and height field. Case types and matches let you essentially "unmix" distinct data types after they are mixed together in the program flow. Without case types, this would be impossible to do in a type safe manner.

Wildcard matches

Match expressions can optionally end with a wildcard match, which is the same as a regular case match except that it doesn't include a tag. The wildcard branch will be taken if the runtime tag of the matched value does not match any of the explicitly listed tags in the match expression.

let calculate_area = fun shape ->
    match shape with
        | `Circle v -> v.rad *. v.rad *. 3.1415926
        | `Rectangle v -> v.length *. v.height
        |  v -> "got something unexpected!"

Within a wildcard match, the bound variable has the same type as the input expression, except with the explicitly matched cases statically excluded. For example, in the calculate_area example above, v would have the type "same as shape except not a Circle or Rectangle".

This makes it possible to further match on the wildcard value elsewhere. For example, in the below code, the new calculate_area2 function explicitly handles the Square case and otherwise defers to the previously defined function to handle the Circle and Rectangle cases. This works because the compiler knows that the v in the wildcard branch is not a Square, so it will not complain that the original calculate_area function fails to handle squares.

let calculate_area = fun shape ->
    match shape with
        | `Circle v -> v.rad *. v.rad *. 3.1415926
        | `Rectangle v -> v.length *. v.height;

let calculate_area2 = fun shape ->
    match shape with
        | `Square v -> v.len *. v.len
        |  v -> calculate_area v;

calculate_area2 `Circle {rad=6.7}
calculate_area2 `Square {len=9.17}

Literals

Cubiml has boolean, int, float, string, and null literals. Integers are arbitrary precision and can't have leading zeros. Floating point literals must contain a decimal point, but the fraction part is optional. Strings are double quoted and use backslash escapes.

true;
false;
null;
0;
-213132;
999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999;
8.213;
-1.;
-0.01e33;
7.e-77;
"";
"Hello world!";
"Quote -> \" backslash -> \\ Single quote -> \'"

Operators

Use +, -, *, /, % for integer math. For floating point math, add a . to the end of the operator, e.g. 7.5 /. 12.0. String concatenation is ^.

<, <=, >, >= can compare both ints and floats. == and != compare values of any type (values of different types compare unequal).

5 * 2 + 1;
-1 <= 0;
7.5 /. 12.0;
0 > 0.1;
9 == "what?";
"Hello," ^ " World!";
"" != {}

References

Cubiml supports mutability via ML-style references. You can simulate traditional mutable fields by storing a reference in a record field, and a mutable variable by storing a reference in a variable and so on.

ML references are not quite the same as what you may be used to. They are pointers to a mutable, garbage collected storage location on the heap and support three operations:

• ref x creates a new reference that initially holds the value x. Note that this copies the value of x to a new location and returns a pointer to that location. ref foo.bar returns a pointer to a location that is initialized to the value of foo.bar, rather than a pointer to the field of foo itself.
• !r dereferences the reference r and returns whatever value is currently stored inside. Note that this differs from the ! operator in C style syntax.
• r := x stores x inside the reference r, overwriting whatever value was previously stored there. Traditionally, this operation returns a unit value (i.e. empty record), but cubiml instead follows the approach of C-style assignments as Javascript does, where assignment returns the new value.

Note that references may be aliased. For example, we can create a reference a and copy it to the variable b. Then any changes made via b are visible via a and vice versa, as shown in the following REPL session.

>> let a = ref 42

ref 42

>> let b = a

ref 42

>> b := 77

77

>> !a

77

Record extension

When creating a record, you can optionally copy over all the fields from another record by writing foo with at the start of the record, where foo is the record you want to copy from.

let foo = {a=1; b=""; c=false};
let bar = {foo with a=true; d=-23}

The value you are copying fields from does not have to be a statically known value. It can be any arbitrary expression (as long as you surround it in parenthesis).

>> let baz = {(if foo.c then foo else bar) with c=true}

{a=true; b=""; c=true; d=-23}

Comments

Comments use (* *) and cannot be nested.

(* define x = 4 *)
let x = 4;

let y = x + (
    (* 2 is an int *) 
    2
);

let z = (* let's define a new record! *) {
    (* a is a record field *)
    a = x;

    b = 
        (* comments can also go before expressions *) 
        "Hello world!";

    c = match `Some y with
        | `Some y -> y
        (* this match arm isn't actually reachable *)
        | `None _ -> _
}

Type annotations

Expressions can manually be annotated with a type via (expr : type), e.g. (24 : int) or (fun x -> x : str -> str). Type annotations can be one of the following:

Base types

The primitive types are bool, float, int, str, null, number, top, bot.

number represents a value that can be an int or a float.

top is the supertype of all types. bot is the subtype of all types. It's impossible to do anything useful with a value of type top, while it is impossible to create a value of type bot.

Nullable types

type?

Functions types

type -> type

Function type arrows have the lowest precedence. For example int -> int? is parsed as int -> (int?), i.e. a function that takes an int and returns an int or null. To represent a function or null, you need to instead write (int -> int)?.

Reference types

type ref, type readonly ref, or type writeonly ref

Record types

Explicit list of fields:

{field1: type1; field2: type2}

Explicit list of fields plus any number of fields not mentioned:

{_ with field1: type1; field2: type2}

Note: The list of fields cannot be empty. {} is not a valid type annotation. Use top instead.

Case types

Explicit list of cases:

[tag1 of type1 | tag2 of type2]

Explicit list of cases plus any number of cases not mentioned:

[_ | tag1 of type1 | tag2 of type2]

Note: The list of cases cannot be empty. [] is not a valid type annotation. Use bot instead.

Holes

_ creates a fresh type variable. Effectively, this leaves a hole which gets filled in with the corresponding part of the inferred type. It is useful if you only want to constrain part of the type with a type annotation.

For example if you have a record foo, with fields a and b you could write (foo : {a: int; b: _}) to ensure foo.a is an int while placing no constraints on foo.b.

_ can also be used to extend record and case type annotations with any number of fields or tags not specified. For example the above example could also be written (foo : {_ with a: int}). This says that foo has a field named a that is an int and can have any number of other fields with any types. Likewise you can write types like [_ | `A of int | `B of str] to represent a case type where the A tag has type int, the B tag has type str, and there can be any number of other tags not specified with any types.

Recursive types

You can give an explicit name to a type via type as 'name and then reference it later via 'name. This lets you express recursive types. For example, the following code demonstrates a type annotation with a simple recursive list type:

let rec build_list = fun n ->
    if n < 0 then
        null
    else
        {val=n; next=build_list (n - 1)};

let list = (build_list 4 : {val: int; next: 'list}? as 'list)

Type aliases can appear anywhere within a type annotation, not just at the top level. This means you can define multiple type variables within a type annotation, allowing you to express mutually recursive types.

Building cubiml from source

You will need to have lalrpop and wasm-pack installed. First, generate the parser code

lalrpop src/grammar.lalr

Then build the wasm module and js wrapper with wasm-pack

wasm-pack build --target web