spitsh / spitsh

👻The Spook in the Shell🐚 compiler

👻 Spook in the Shell 👻 (Spit-sh)

Spook in the Shell (Spit or Spit-sh) is a language/compiler that outputs shell scripts. It compiles a strongly typed Perl 6 like language called "Spook" into /bin/sh compatible scripts. It's main purpose is devops/infrastructure related tasks. Current features include:

• Compile time type checking
• Basic libraries/modules
• Test module for outputting TAP
• Useful builtin classes and functions
• Running and testing scripts in Docker
• Logging to standard output

Everything about the language and compiler is still experimental. I am thinking about pivoting a bit into compiling golang to create standalone binaries instead of shell scripts. 🤔

Example

To get an idea of what Spit is consider the following basic program:

.install unless Pkg<nc>; # install nc unless it's already there
ok Cmd<nc>,"nc command exists now"; # test the nc command is there

You can compile this for CentOS from the command line like:

spit eval --os=centos  '.install unless Pkg<nc>; ok Cmd<nc>,"nc command exists now"'

Which ouputs the following shell at the time of writing:

BEGIN(){
  e(){ printf %s "$1"; }
  exec 4>/dev/null
  installed(){ yum list installed "$1" >&4 2>&4; }
  install(){ yum install -y $1 >&4 2>&4; }
  exists(){ command -v "$1" >&4; }
  exec 3>&1
  say(){ printf '%s\n' "$1" >&3; }
  note(){ printf '%s\n' "$1" >&2; }
  die(){ note "$1" && kill "-TERM" $$ >&4; }
  ok(){ test "$1" && say "✔ - $2" || die "✘ - $2"; }
}
MAIN(){
  if ! installed nc; then
    install nc
  fi
  ok "$(exists nc && e 1)" 'nc command exists now'
}
BEGIN && MAIN

If you have docker installed you can test this with:

spit eval --in-docker=centos '.install unless Pkg<nc>; ok Cmd<nc>,"nc command exists now"'
✔ - nc command exists now

Unfortunately on Debian the package is named 'netcat'. Let's deal with that:

# install-nc.sp
constant Pkg $nc = on {
    Debian { 'netcat' }
    Any    { 'nc' } # the default
};

.install unless $nc;
ok Cmd<nc>,"nc command exists now";

And now it should work on both the RHEL and Debian families of Linux distributions.

spit  compile install-nc.sp --in-docker=debian:latest
✔ - nc command exists now

Install

Spit is written in Perl 6 and requires rakudo and something to install Perl 6 ecosystem modules with like zef.

zef install Spit

and run

spit eval 'say "hello world"'

To check it's working.

Documentation

The documentation is pretty useless at the moment because the tooling has fallen far behind the language. What exists is under: doc/.

Project Layout

• The Perl 6 Spit compiler module is in lib
• The actual Spit source code is under resources/src
• The core spit modules are under resouces/core-lib
• The spec tests are in spec.

spitsh's Issues

Topic not set in if on or junction

if Cmd<echo> || Cmd<printf> {
    .say;
}

ERROR while compiling tmp/bug.sp: Scalar variable '_' hasn't been declared.
tmp/bug.sp:2
if Cmd<echo> || Cmd<printf> {
    ➧.say;
}

Likely bug with anon state var

Haven't run the code and just spotted this while reviewing some ecosystem code.

The {$++}" on this line needs to be changed to $($++)" or to " ~ $++:

spitsh/lib/Spit/Sh/Composer.pm6

Line 526 in 9bfc183

name => "eval_{$++}",

With original version, the state var is in its own block, which gets cloned when the outer block is entered, so the var ends up always being set to 1.

m: for ^3 { say "and {++$}"; }
rakudo-moar e9351cbaa: OUTPUT: «and 1␤and 1␤and 1␤»

m: for ^3 { say "and $(++$)"; }
rakudo-moar e9351cbaa: OUTPUT: «and 1␤and 2␤and 3␤»
m: for ^3 { say "and " ~ ++$; }
rakudo-moar e9351cbaa: OUTPUT: «and 1␤and 2␤and 3␤»

.parse-names won't exist in 6.e language

The parse-names is now named uniparse, as of Rakudo version 2017.12-10-ge5c38ad

The original parse-names will continue to work for some time. It will issue a deprecation warning when 6.d language will be released (around first half of 2018) and will be removed entirely in 6.e language.

More info: Raku/doc@bff42f80b1

sub 'if' hasn't been declared

$spit eval 'if Foo { }'
ERROR while compiling eval: Sub 'if' hasn't been declared.
eval:0
➧if Foo { }

(Foo is a non existant symbol). When doing this in rakudo you get:

$ perl6 -e 'if Foo { }'
===SORRY!===
Function 'Foo' needs parens to avoid gobbling block (or perhaps it's a class that's not declared or available in this scope?)
at -e:1
------> if Foo { }⏏<EOL>
Missing block (apparently claimed by 'Foo')
at -e:1
------> if Foo { }⏏<EOL>

trailing comma in routine signature causes parse error

ERROR while compiling file<lib/Rakudo.sp>: Couldn't find closing ‘)’ to finish parameter list.
file<lib/Rakudo.sp>:12
    }

    static method build(
        :$checkout = $:checkout,
        :$prefix = $:prefix,
        :$build-dir = $:build-dir )↩,
    ) {
        Rakudo.install-deps;

Unbitrotting/possible takeover?

Hello,

I came across this project while browsing former conference talks on Perl6/Raku and it really made me interested.

Unfortunately, as suspected, it's kind of in a sleeping state. I think it would be a huge loss of the whole Raku community to let these great projects be lost for good so let me ask: are contributions welcome, or alternatively, are you open to donate the project altogether? I'm willing to start with necessary maintenance work and I also have plans for using this tool so probably I could pick it up the hard way.

I hope we can revive it directly, without starting with a fork - however, if this issue doesn't have a resolution, even a fork might be better than losing all the value.

Exceptions on installation

This is at least since 2020.06 release. The testing goes ok and then:

➜  ~ zef install Spit
===> Searching for: Spit
===> Searching for missing dependencies: DispatchMap, JSON::Tiny
===> Testing: DispatchMap:ver<0.2.3>
===> Testing [OK] for DispatchMap:ver<0.2.3>
===> Testing: JSON::Tiny:ver<1.0>
===> Testing [OK] for JSON::Tiny:ver<1.0>
===> Testing: Spit:ver<0.0.31>
[Spit] precompiling SETTING
===> Testing [OK] for Spit:ver<0.0.31>
===> Installing: DispatchMap:ver<0.2.3>
===> Installing: JSON::Tiny:ver<1.0>
===> Installing: Spit:ver<0.0.31>
===> Install [FAIL] for Spit:ver<0.0.31>: precompiling SETTING
===SORRY!=== Error while compiling /home/koto/site#sources/439BF46620E5A9ABA6750AED8F3C39E466FF18DE (Spit::PRECOMP::SETTING)
An exception occurred while evaluating a constant
at /home/koto/site#sources/439BF46620E5A9ABA6750AED8F3C39E466FF18DE (Spit::PRECOMP::SETTING):7
Exception details:
  ===SORRY!=== Error while compiling
  Not enough positional arguments; needed at least 2
  at :

precompiling SETTING
===SORRY!=== Error while compiling /home/koto/site#sources/439BF46620E5A9ABA6750AED8F3C39E466FF18DE (Spit::PRECOMP::SETTING)
An exception occurred while evaluating a constant
at /home/koto/site#sources/439BF46620E5A9ABA6750AED8F3C39E466FF18DE (Spit::PRECOMP::SETTING):7
Exception details:
  ===SORRY!=== Error while compiling
  Not enough positional arguments; needed at least 2
  at :

➜  ~ raku --version
This is Rakudo version 2020.06 built on MoarVM version 2020.06
implementing Raku 6.d.
'⏎                                                                                                                                                             ➜  ~