built1n / ducky

A simple BASIC-like programming language compiling into C

Ducky

IRC: #ducky-lang at irc.freenode.net

Introduction

Ducky is a BASIC-like programming language originally insipred by Duckyscript, the USB Rubber Ducky's scripting language.

Examples

Hello World

#!/bin/ducky
LOG Hello, world!
NEWLINE

Simple!

Fibonacci Sequence

#!/bin/ducky
LET a = 0; LET b = 0; LET iter = 0
LABEL loop_start
LOGVAR a
NEWLINE
LET c = a+b
LET a = b
LET b = c
INC iter
IF iter < 20; GOTO loop_start
LOG Done!
NEWLINE

Prime Counter

#!/bin/ducky
LOG Counting...
NEWLINE
LET primes=0
LET MAX=100000
LET n = 2
LBL test_number
LET iter = 2
LET stop = sqrt n
LBL test_loop
IF !(n % iter); GOTO composite
INC iter
IF iter <= stop; GOTO test_loop
INC primes
LBL composite
INC n
IF n < MAX; GOTO test_number
LOG Number of primes below
LOGVAR MAX
LOG :
LOGVAR primes
NEWLINE

Building

POSIX systems are supported, as are some Rockbox targets.

Unix/Linux

make
sudo make install

This installs the /bin/ducky binary.

Usage

Running Directly (no compilation)

ducky scriptname.ds

Compiling to bytecode

ducky -c scriptname.ds

This will create a.out, which contains the bytecode.

Executing bytecode

ducky a.out

Full Compile (from ducky to machine code)

ducky -a scriptname.ds
./a.out

Technical Details

The program consists of four parts: the interpreter, compiler, bytecode interpreter, and C transcompiler.

Interpreter

Executes ducky directly.

Bytecode Compiler

Compiles ducky to a stack-machine based bytecode.

Bytecode Interpreter

Executes the bytecode generated by the bytecode compiler.

C Transcompiler

Translates bytecode generated by the bytecode compiler into C.

Benchmark Results

21 Nov 2015:

c - clang     26 27 27 27 27 27 27 27 27 27 - AVG 26.9
c - gcc       29 29 29 29 29 29 29 29 29 29 - AVG 29
c - tcc       28 28 28 28 28 28 28 28 28 28 - AVG 28
ducky - clang 15 15 15 15 15 15 15 15 15 15 - AVG 15
ducky - gcc   28 28 28 28 28 28 28 28 28 26 - AVG 27.8

26 Nov 2015:

Language	Compiler	Optimization Level	Scores	Mean score
Ducky	Clang	-O0	4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4	4
Ducky	Clang	-O1	15 15 15 15 15 15 15 15 15 15	15
Ducky	Clang	-O2	21 21 21 21 21 21 21 21 21 21	21
Ducky	Clang	-O3	21 21 21 21 21 21 21 21 21 21	21
Ducky	GCC	-O0	5 5 4 5 5 5 5 5 5 5	4.9
Ducky	GCC	-O1	22 23 23 23 23 23 23 23 23 23	22.9
Ducky	GCC	-O2	26 26 26 26 26 26 26 26 26 26	26
Ducky	GCC	-O3	26 26 26 26 26 26 26 26 26 26	26
C	Clang	-O0	28 28 28 28 28 28 28 28 28 28	28
C	Clang	-O1	28 29 29 28 28 28 28 28 29 29	28.4
C	Clang	-O2	28 29 29 29 28 29 29 28 28 28	28.4
C	Clang	-O3	28 28 28 29 28 29 28 29 28 28	28.3
C	GCC	-O0	28 28 28 28 28 28 28 28 28 28	28
C	GCC	-O1	30 30 30 30 29 30 29 30 30 29	29.7
C	GCC	-O2	30 30 30 30 30 30 30 30 30 30	30
C	GCC	-O3	30 30 30 30 30 30 30 30 30 30	30

Future Directions

• Refactor code
• Input
• Add more builtins
• Arrays?
• Functions?