Ask HN: What non-mainstream programming languages are you checking out?

9 points·fuzztester··16 comments

Question inspired by this current HN thread about Jank:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40640534

Not exactly esoteric but I use PowerShell for everything. So it isn’t a mainstream language for many of my use cases since they’re not system admin related.

Lately I come back to posh [1] a modular and very simple (maybe even barebones) shell language. There is not much to it really, but the simplicity is a starting point for me. It gives me a bit execline [2] vibes.

[1] https://github.com/mikebolt/posh

[2] https://skarnet.org/software/execline/

Zig. I really enjoyed it and works well with WebAssembly. Definitively something I consider for low level while safe development.

Are you using it only with assembly or also on other targets?

I used it to create a fantasy console running in the browser (https://github.com/shazz/ZigMachine) which is more constrained due to the webassembly limitations but I would definitely use it for native dev.

Cool, thanks.

Verilog. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Verilog

This is definitely mainstream.

Wren looked interesting: https://wren.io/

ABC Charity Esterel FL Fractran GPM Hope Lean MCPL NESL Oz ProTem Рапира rpython Squiggol UNITY USELESS

You should look at Refal as well.

Thanks, and Refal reminds me of Beatrice (which I only encountered after https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=36579681 , so sorry for the lack of inclusion)

Vala - I really wish it had more support on Windows

Pike looked interesting at some point

Crystal

Haxe

Stoic - an Ur forth

BitGrid - a novel computational fabric

Gleam, Grain, Uiua

J, APL.

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