Getting Started

Installation

From source (Rust)

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/otabekoff/zink.git
cd zink/lang

# Build the release binary
cargo build --release

# The binary is at target/release/zink (or zink.exe on Windows)

Run a file

./target/release/zink examples/hello.zink

Start the REPL

./target/release/zink
# ⚡ Zink v0.1.0 — REPL
# >>> say "Hello!"
# Hello!

Pipe from stdin

echo 'say "Hello from pipe!"' | ./target/release/zink -

Try Online

No installation needed — use the Zink Playground to write and run Zink code directly in your browser.

Your First Program

Create a file called hello.zink:

# hello.zink
let name = "World"
say "Hello, {name}!"

fn add(a, b) {
  return a + b
}

say "2 + 3 = {add(2, 3)}"

Run it:

./target/release/zink hello.zink
# Hello, World!
# 2 + 3 = 5

Project Structure

zink/
├── lang/               # Rust interpreter
│   ├── src/
│   │   ├── main.rs     # CLI + REPL
│   │   ├── lib.rs      # Library + WASM bindings
│   │   ├── lexer.rs    # Tokenizer
│   │   ├── parser.rs   # AST builder
│   │   └── interpreter.rs  # Evaluator
│   └── examples/       # Example .zink programs
├── playground/         # Browser playground (React + Vite)
├── docs/               # This documentation (VitePress)
└── extension/          # VS Code extension

Next Steps

• Variables — Learn about let bindings
• Functions — Define and call functions
• Control Flow — if, while, and loop
• Built-in Functions — 28 functions included