trivial/README.md
2015-12-14 05:37:17 -05:00

94 lines
2.5 KiB
Markdown

trivial
===
[![Build Status](https://travis-ci.org/bennn/trivial.svg)](https://travis-ci.org/bennn/trivial)
[![Coverage Status](https://coveralls.io/repos/bennn/trivial/badge.svg?branch=master&service=github)](https://coveralls.io/github/bennn/trivial?branch=master)
This library provides ``smarter'' versions of Typed Racket standard library functions.
For example:
```
#lang typed/racket/base
(require trivial)
(printf: "hello, ~a")
;; Compiling yields...
;;
;; format:: arity mismatch;
;; the expected number of arguments does not match the given number
;; expected: 1
;; given: 0
```
The `printf:` (with a colon) checks whether its first argument is a string literal.
If so, it parses the string's format sequences for arity and type constraints.
Unless the constraints fail, `printf:` then calls the standard `printf`.
When the first argument to `printf:` is not a string literal, nothing special happens; we just call the standard `printf`.
```
#lang typed/racket/base
(require trivial)
(let ([s "hello, ~a\n"])
(printf: s)) ;; Non-trivial!
;; Compiles successfully, but throws arity error at runtime
```
Besides `printf:`, this library also provides [macros](http://www.greghendershott.com/fear-of-macros/)
for:
- `regexp-match`, to count the number of groups in a pattern and give the match result a more specific type
- `+`, `-`, `*`, `/`, to reduce constants where possible, yielding results with more specific types.
See the [documentation](http://pkg-build.racket-lang.org/doc/trivial/index.html) for the full story.
Install
---
From Github:
```
> git clone https://github.com/bennn/trivial
> raco pkg install ./trivial
```
From the Racket [package server](http://pkgs.racket-lang.org/):
```
> raco pkg install trivial
```
Use `(require trivial)` to import all bindings from this library.
Each file in the root directory of this repo can be imported specifically, as in:
- `(require trivial/format)`
- `(require trivial/regexp)`
- `(require trivial/math)`
These files only export macros.
Naming
---
- The library is "trivial" because it solves only the simplest typechecking problems, and does so simply by analyzing a local chunk of source code.
- By convention, we suffix all our exports with a trailing colon.
This is a hint that the macro will attempt some extra static analysis (including typechecking) at its call-site.
Contributing
---
The perfect feature request would start like:
"Typed Racket rejects this program, but it is obviously well-typed because ..."
If the right type really is obvious, syntactically, we'll extend this library.