Reproduces deps/basicinterpret in C, in the idiom of the ak* libraries. All 41
.bas files in the reference's corpus produce byte-identical stdout, including
the trailing double newline on an error line -- that comes from basicError
building a string ending in \n and handing it to Println, and
array_outofbounds.txt encodes it.
The corpus is driven in place from the submodule as 41 individual CTest cases
rather than copied, so it cannot drift from upstream. Eighteen unit tests cover
what the corpus cannot reach.
Three structural changes carry most of the work. Go's three reflection lookups
(Command*, Function*, ParseCommand*) become one sorted dispatch table in
src/verbs.c searched with bsearch; adding a verb is a row and two functions. The
five Go maps become one fixed open-addressed table over aksl_strhash_djb2. And
run(), which owned the process until MODE_QUIT, splits into step() plus a
bounded run() -- goal 3 requires a host game to be able to bound execution, and
nothing in the library now terminates the process or touches SDL.
Output goes through an akbasic_TextSink vtable. src/sink_stdio.c is what makes
the corpus runnable with no SDL present; the akgl-backed sink is still to come
and is blocked on libakgl having no text-measurement call.
src/convert.c exists because libakstdlib's aksl_ato* family cannot report a
conversion failure (its TODO.md 2.1.5). The reference checks strconv's error at
four sites and turns it into a BASIC error; routing those through aksl_atoi
would have turned four diagnosable errors into wrong answers, with VAL("garbage")
quietly returning 0. TODO.md 1.9 records which libakstdlib calls are cleared for
use here and which are not.
Reference defects are reproduced, not fixed: the golden files encode the observed
behaviour and a silent correction is a behaviour change. TODO.md section 6 lists
sixteen, and tests/known_reference_defects.c asserts the *correct* contract for
six of them under AKBASIC_KNOWN_FAILING_TESTS, so a fix shows up as
"unexpectedly passed". Five of the sixteen were found by this port and are new:
subtraction stops after one operator so 1-2-3 computes 1-2 and abandons the rest
of the line (a wrong answer, not a refused one); a unary-minus argument inflates
a function's arity so ABS(-9) is rejected; a comparison operator in a line's
final column is dropped; hex literals never survive the scanner; and the
"Reserved word in variable name" check is dead code.
Where the reference reaches undefined behaviour by a route that is defined in Go
-- an out-of-range shift, a negative string multiplier, integer division by zero
-- this raises instead of inheriting the UB. No golden case exercises any of
them.
The top-level CMakeLists shadows add_test, set_tests_properties and
add_custom_target around all three add_subdirectory calls. Without it libakerror's
tests land in our suite as Not Run, and its un-namespaced `coverage` target stops
a coverage build from configuring at all. Test targets are akbasic_test_<name>:
bare test_<name> collides with libakstdlib's, which is what broke libakgl's
configure in c2b16d3.
ctest 59/59; ASan+UBSan 59/59; 92.3% line and 96.9% function coverage; no
warnings under -Wall -Wextra. Branch coverage is not a target, for the reason
libakstdlib and libakgl both record: the akerror macros expand into large branch
trees at every call site.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
34 KiB
TODO
Implementation plan for the Go → C port of deps/basicinterpret.
This file is written to be executed by AI agents, not read by humans for inspiration. Every
item names the files it touches, the exact deliverable, and the command that proves it done.
Work the phases in order. Inside a phase, items with no Depends: line may be done in
parallel.
0. Agent protocol
Read these before touching anything, in this order:
CLAUDE.mdin this repository — project goals, thelibakerrorconvention, the error-code range map, and the dependency versions.deps/libakerror/AGENTS.md— theATTEMPT/CLEANUP/PROCESS/HANDLE/FINISHprotocol.deps/libakerror/UPGRADING.md— 1.0.0's status registry. Required before writing an error code; the mechanism it replaced is gone.deps/libakstdlib/TODO.md§2.1 — six confirmed defects in the library this port calls into. §1.9 below says which calls are cleared for use; that section is not optional reading, it bans a family of functions the port would otherwise reach for by reflex.deps/libakgl/AGENTS.md— the no-mallocrule and the commit co-author requirement.deps/basicinterpret/README.md— the language reference and the unimplemented list.
Rules for working this file:
- Do not mark an item done until its acceptance command passes on a clean out-of-tree build. "It compiles" is not acceptance.
- Do update this file in the same commit as the work: strike the item, or replace it with the defect it uncovered. This file holds outstanding items only.
- Do add the agent program name, model name and version as a commit co-author. That rule
comes from
libakgland applies here. - Never hand-edit generated output.
build/trees and the generatedakerror.hare off-limits; change the generator. - Never reformat a file you are not otherwise changing.
- When a step is blocked because
libakglcannot supply a capability, do not work around it here. File it indeps/libakgl/TODO.mdin the numbered prose style of that file's "Carried over" section and note the block in §7 below.
Style, restated so nobody has to go look: C99, 4-space indent, tabs at width 8
(stroustrup), function-body braces in column 0 on their own line, control braces on the same
line, always brace, spaces inside control-flow parens — if ( x == y ) {. Pointer star
binds to the identifier: char *name. Prefix is akbasic_ for functions,
akbasic_TypeName for types, AKBASIC_UPPER_SNAKE for macros. static helpers drop the
prefix. Parameter names must match between header and source.
1. Design decisions already made
These are settled. Do not relitigate them mid-port; if evidence says one is wrong, say so in a commit that changes it deliberately, and update this section.
1.1 Reflection becomes one aligned dispatch table
The Go runtime resolves verbs with reflect.MethodByName("Command" + NAME)
(basicruntime.go:401), functions with "Function" + NAME, and special parse paths with
"ParseCommand" + NAME (basicparser.go:103). C has no reflection and we are not adding
any. Replace all three with one static table in src/verbs.c, sorted by name, searched
with bsearch(3):
/* name token type parse handler exec handler */
{ "AUTO", AKBASIC_TOK_CMDIMM, NULL, cmd_auto },
{ "DATA", AKBASIC_TOK_COMMAND, parse_data, cmd_data },
{ "DEF", AKBASIC_TOK_COMMAND, parse_def, cmd_def },
A NULL parse handler means "parse the rval as a plain expression", which is exactly what
commandByReflection returning (nil, nil) means today. Adding a verb is adding one row plus
two functions. Keep the table column-aligned and one row per verb — it is a table, so it
gets laid out as one.
This also kills the Go scanner's three separate maps (reservedwords, commands,
functions, basicscanner.go:64-67): the token type lives in the same row.
1.2 Strings are fixed-size and live inline
libakstdlib has no string type. libakgl has akgl_String but it is PATH_MAX bytes,
refcounted, and pool-allocated — wrong shape for a value that gets copied on every
assignment, and it would drag a libakgl dependency into the core interpreter.
Define in include/akbasic/types.h:
#define AKBASIC_MAX_STRING_LENGTH 256 /* matches AKBASIC_MAX_LINE_LENGTH */
and give akbasic_Value a char stringval[AKBASIC_MAX_STRING_LENGTH] inline. clone()
becomes a struct assignment. No allocator, no refcount, no lifetime question.
Tradeoff, stated: every akbasic_Value is ~300 bytes, so one environment's
values[AKBASIC_MAX_VALUES] pool is ~19KB, and 32 environments is ~610KB of BSS. That is
fine on a PC and is the price of never calling malloc. If it ever isn't fine, the knob is
AKBASIC_MAX_STRING_LENGTH, not the allocator.
Truncation is an error, not a silent clamp: FAIL_RETURN(e, AKBASIC_ERR_VALUE, ...).
1.3 Maps become fixed-capacity open-addressed tables
Five Go maps need replacing:
| Go site | Purpose | C replacement |
|---|---|---|
BasicScanner.reservedwords/commands/functions |
keyword → token type | the §1.1 static table + bsearch |
BasicEnvironment.variables |
name → *BasicVariable |
akbasic_SymbolTable, capacity AKBASIC_MAX_VARIABLES |
BasicEnvironment.functions |
name → *BasicFunctionDef |
akbasic_SymbolTable, capacity AKBASIC_MAX_FUNCTIONS |
BasicEnvironment.labels |
name → line number | akbasic_SymbolTable, capacity AKBASIC_MAX_LABELS |
One implementation, src/symtab.c, keyed by aksl_strhash_djb2() (already in
libakstdlib) with linear probing and a fixed slot array. Use the existing hash; do not
write another one. Table full is an error, not a resize.
Caveat, from deps/libakstdlib/TODO.md §1.6/§2.2.6: the wrapper sign-extends char, so a
high-bit byte hashes wrong — "\xff\xfe" returns 5859874 where the unsigned char answer is
5868578. BASIC identifiers are 7-bit ASCII (the scanner only accepts IsLetter/IsDigit plus
a type suffix), so this cannot bite the symbol tables. It would bite if anyone later keys
a table on a string literal or a filename. Do not work around it here; it is already filed
upstream.
1.4 Environments come from a pool and are released
Go calls new(BasicEnvironment) at basicruntime.go:121 and basicparser_commands.go:124
and never frees one. A long-running GOSUB or FOR in Go leaks; the GC eventually catches
some of it, and nothing in the tests notices.
C gets HEAP_ENVIRONMENT[AKBASIC_MAX_ENVIRONMENTS] with
akbasic_env_acquire() / akbasic_env_release(), in the shape of akgl_heap_next_*.
akbasic_runtime_prev_environment() must release the environment it pops. Pool
exhaustion is AKBASIC_ERR_ENVIRONMENT, reported with the current line number.
Watch the one place this is not a clean stack: userFunction (basicruntime.go:348) stores
a BasicEnvironment by value inside BasicFunctionDef and re-init()s it on every call.
In C the funcdef holds an akbasic_Environment * acquired at DEF time and reset per call —
it is owned by the funcdef, not the pool's free list, until the funcdef dies.
1.5 Output goes through a text sink backend
Write() and Println() (basicruntime_graphics.go:140,148) mirror every line to stdout
and to an SDL surface. That mirror is the only reason the golden-file suite works. Do not
reproduce it as a hardcoded pair of calls.
Define a record of function pointers, populated by an initializer — the house pattern:
typedef struct akbasic_TextSink
{
void *self;
akerr_ErrorContext AKERR_NOIGNORE *(*write)(struct akbasic_TextSink *self, char *text);
akerr_ErrorContext AKERR_NOIGNORE *(*writeln)(struct akbasic_TextSink *self, char *text);
akerr_ErrorContext AKERR_NOIGNORE *(*readline)(struct akbasic_TextSink *self, char *dest, size_t len);
akerr_ErrorContext AKERR_NOIGNORE *(*clear)(struct akbasic_TextSink *self);
} akbasic_TextSink;
akbasic_sink_init_stdio() in the library, akbasic_sink_init_akgl() in the akgl-backed
module (phase 9). The driver picks. Cursor arithmetic, wrapping and scrolling belong to the
akgl sink, not to the interpreter.
1.6 The interpreter steps; it does not run
Go's run() (basicruntime.go:682) is a for {} that owns the process until MODE_QUIT.
Goal 3 forbids that: a host game must be able to bound execution.
The library exposes:
akerr_ErrorContext AKERR_NOIGNORE *akbasic_runtime_step(akbasic_Runtime *obj);
akerr_ErrorContext AKERR_NOIGNORE *akbasic_runtime_run(akbasic_Runtime *obj, int maxsteps);
_step() does exactly what one iteration of Go's for {} body does and returns.
_run(obj, maxsteps) loops _step() until the mode is AKBASIC_MODE_QUIT or maxsteps
steps have elapsed; maxsteps <= 0 means unbounded, which is what the standalone driver
passes. This is a deliberate restructure, and it must not change a single byte of golden
output.
QUIT sets AKBASIC_MODE_QUIT and returns. Nothing in the library calls exit(),
abort(), or FINISH_NORETURN. FINISH_NORETURN appears exactly once in the tree, in
src/main.c.
1.7 Error codes are absolute, reserved from the 1.0.0 registry
deps/libakerror is at 1.0.0. Read deps/libakerror/UPGRADING.md before writing an error
code; CLAUDE.md's error-code section is the condensed version. Three things this changes
from what you may have seen in an older draft or in libakgl:
AKERR_MAX_ERR_VALUEno longer exists. The name registry is sparse and takes anyint. There is nothing for a consumer to size, and no compile definition to set. Anywhere you find one, delete it.__AKERR_ERROR_NAMESno longer exists. The table is private.- Codes are absolute integer constants at 256 or above, never
AKERR_LAST_ERRNO_VALUE + N. The offset scheme is what produced the livelibakglcollision documented inCLAUDE.md.
akbasic owns 512–767 per the range map in CLAUDE.md. Declare it as an enum, so the
values stay compile-time integer constants (HANDLE expands to case labels, which require
that) and adding a code does not mean renumbering an offset:
#define AKBASIC_OWNER "akbasic"
enum {
AKBASIC_ERR_BASE = 512, /** Start of akbasic's reserved status range */
AKBASIC_ERR_SYNTAX = AKBASIC_ERR_BASE,
/** Parse-time grammar violation */
AKBASIC_ERR_TYPE, /** Incompatible types in an operation */
AKBASIC_ERR_UNDEFINED, /** Reference to an undefined verb, function or label */
AKBASIC_ERR_BOUNDS, /** Array subscript or pool index out of range */
AKBASIC_ERR_ENVIRONMENT, /** Environment pool exhausted or orphaned environment */
AKBASIC_ERR_VALUE, /** A value was malformed, truncated or unconvertible */
AKBASIC_ERR_STATE, /** A verb ran outside the block structure it requires */
AKBASIC_ERR_LIMIT = AKBASIC_ERR_BASE + 256
};
akbasic_init() reserves the whole 256 in one call and then names each code. Both
registry calls return akerr_ErrorContext * and are AKERR_NOIGNORE, so a collision is an
ordinary error — PASS it and let it propagate out of init:
akerr_ErrorContext AKERR_NOIGNORE *akbasic_init(void)
{
PREPARE_ERROR(errctx);
PASS(errctx, akerr_reserve_status_range(AKBASIC_ERR_BASE,
AKBASIC_ERR_LIMIT - AKBASIC_ERR_BASE,
AKBASIC_OWNER));
PASS(errctx, akerr_register_status_name(AKBASIC_OWNER, AKBASIC_ERR_SYNTAX,
"Syntax Error"));
/* ... one per code ... */
SUCCEED_RETURN(errctx);
}
Reserve the whole range in one call — a subset or superset of your own range raises
AKERR_STATUS_RANGE_OVERLAP, not a no-op. Use akerr_register_status_name(), never the
two-argument akerr_name_for_status(status, name) set path: the owned form is the one that
catches a component writing into a range that is not its own, and the two-argument form is
what let libakgl silently clobber libakerror's names.
There is no startup ceiling to assert any more — the BSS-overflow hazard the old draft
defended against was deleted along with AKERR_MAX_ERR_VALUE. What replaces it is the
reservation itself: if akbasic_init() returns an error, something else owns part of 512–767
and the process must not continue as though it does not.
Do not call akerr_init() first. Every registry entry point calls it, and since 1.0.0 it no
longer clears reservations made before it ran.
1.8 Error message text is part of the acceptance contract
tests/language/array_outofbounds.txt is, verbatim:
? 20 : RUNTIME ERROR Variable index access out of bounds at dimension 0: 4 (max 2)\n\n
The trailing double newline is real: basicError builds a string ending in \n and hands it
to Println, which adds another. Reproduce the message strings and the newline behaviour
byte for byte or the golden suite fails for reasons that have nothing to do with the
interpreter. Where a Go message reads awkwardly, keep it awkward and note it here.
Numeric formatting must match too: integers via %" PRId64 ", floats via %f (Go's %f and
C's %f both give six decimals — tests/language/arithmetic/float.txt confirms).
1.9 Which libakstdlib calls are cleared for use, and which are not
deps/libakstdlib is at 0.1.0 and its TODO.md §2.1 lists six confirmed defects. Four
carry a known-failing test, so a green ctest over there does not mean what you would
assume. Three of the six sit directly in the path of this port. Check this table before
reaching for anything in akstdlib.h:
| Call | Verdict | Why |
|---|---|---|
aksl_fopen / _fread / _fwrite / _fclose |
use | DLOAD/DSAVE go through these, never bare libc. aksl_fopen does not NULL-check pathname/mode (§2.2.2) — validate before calling. |
aksl_malloc / _free |
do not use | We allocate nothing. Pools only. |
aksl_memset / _memcpy |
use | No open defects. |
aksl_printf / _fprintf / _sprintf |
use, under protest | The stdio text sink needs them. All three call va_start with no matching va_end on any path (§2.1.4) — undefined behaviour, not ours to fix here, but do not add a fourth wrapper in the same shape. |
aksl_atoi / _atol / _atoll / _atof |
BANNED — see below | Cannot report a conversion failure at all (§2.1.5). |
aksl_realpath |
do not use | Cannot express a buffer size, never NULL-checks resolved_path, and its own error path reads uninitialised memory (§2.1.6). Nothing in the port needs it. |
aksl_strhash_djb2 |
use | See §1.3 for the high-bit caveat, which does not apply to identifiers. |
aksl_list_* |
do not use | aksl_list_append silently truncates to a two-node chain and aksl_list_iterate skips the first half of the list — both confirmed (§2.1.1, §2.1.2). The symbol tables in §1.3 are open-addressed and need none of this. |
aksl_tree_iterate |
do not use | AKERR_ITERATOR_BREAK does not stop the traversal (§2.1.3). Nothing in the port needs a tree. |
The aksl_ato* ban is load-bearing, so here is the whole argument. atoi("not a number")
returns success with 0, and atoi("99999999999999999999") returns success with a
wrapped value. The Go reference checks the conversion error at every one of these sites and
turns it into a BASIC error:
| Go site | What it does on bad input |
|---|---|
basicgrammar.go:224 newLiteralInt → strconv.ParseInt |
returns err, which the parser reports |
basicgrammar.go newLiteralFloat → strconv.ParseFloat |
returns err |
basicscanner.go matchNumber → strconv.Atoi |
PARSE error, "INTEGER CONVERSION ON '%s'" |
basicruntime_functions.go:742 FunctionVAL |
converts a string at runtime and must be able to fail |
Port those onto aksl_ato* and every one of them silently succeeds with 0. That is not a
cosmetic loss: it converts four diagnosable errors into wrong answers, and VAL("garbage")
starts returning 0.000000 instead of raising. The existing golden files would not catch it —
tests/language/functions/val.txt only covers "32", "123.456" and "-256", all valid.
Do this instead: write one local pair of converters in src/convert.c
(akbasic_str_to_int64, akbasic_str_to_double) over strtoll/strtod, with errno = 0
before the call, an endptr check for both "no digits consumed" and "trailing junk", and a
range check — raising AKBASIC_ERR_VALUE and ERANGE respectively. That is the contract
libakstdlib §2.1.5 says the aksl_ato* family should have. When it grows it, delete
src/convert.c and switch the call sites over; until then, do not paper over the gap by
calling the broken function and hoping.
Acceptance for src/convert.c: tests/convert.c — valid decimal, valid hex, empty string,
pure garbage, trailing junk, and an overflowing literal, each asserting the raised status.
Add a .bas/.txt pair for VAL on a non-numeric string in the same commit; there is no
golden coverage for it today.
2. What exists — the port is complete and green
Phases 0 through 6 of the original plan are done. The interpreter builds clean under
-Wall -Wextra, reproduces the reference byte for byte, and passes under ASan and UBSan.
cmake -S . -B build && cmake --build build --parallel
ctest --test-dir build --output-on-failure # 59/59
cmake -S . -B build-asan -DAKBASIC_SANITIZE=ON # 59/59
cmake -S . -B build-cov -DAKBASIC_COVERAGE=ON # 92.3% line, 96.9% function
| Module | Source | Reference |
|---|---|---|
| Strict numeric conversion | src/convert.c |
(new; see §1.9) |
| Symbol table | src/symtab.c |
the five Go maps |
| Value | src/value.c |
basicvalue.go |
| Variable | src/variable.c |
basicvariable.go |
| Tokens and AST leaves | src/grammar.c |
basicgrammar.go + basicparser.go |
| Dispatch table | src/verbs.c |
the three reflection lookups |
| Scanner | src/scanner.c |
basicscanner.go |
| Parser | src/parser.c, src/parser_commands.c |
basicparser*.go |
| Environment | src/environment.c |
basicenvironment.go |
| Runtime | src/runtime.c |
basicruntime.go minus SDL |
| Verbs and functions | src/runtime_commands.c, src/runtime_functions.c |
basicruntime_{commands,functions}.go |
| Text sink | src/sink_stdio.c |
basicruntime_graphics.go's stdout mirror |
| Driver | src/main.c |
main.go |
The acceptance suite is the reference's own corpus, driven in place. All 41 .bas files
under deps/basicinterpret/tests/ are registered as individual CTest cases and byte-compared
against their .txt — including the trailing double newline on an error line (§1.8). Nothing
is copied, so the corpus cannot drift from its upstream.
Eighteen unit tests cover the modules the corpus cannot reach on its own.
tests/known_reference_defects.c is registered in AKBASIC_KNOWN_FAILING_TESTS and asserts
the correct contract for six of the defects in §6; when one is fixed CTest reports
"unexpectedly passed", which is the cue to split that assertion out and strike the item.
Two budget numbers moved during implementation and are worth knowing:
AKBASIC_MAX_ARRAY_ELEMENTS (1024) caps one array and AKBASIC_MAX_ARRAY_VALUES (4096) caps
all of them together, drawn from an akbasic_ValuePool the runtime owns. The reference had no
such ceiling because it called make().
3. Remaining work: the akgl text sink
src/sink_akgl.c. Implement the §1.5 vtable against akgl_text_loadfont and
akgl_text_rendertextat. Owns the cursor, the wrap, and the scroll — everything in
basicruntime_graphics.go except Write/Println, which are now the sink interface itself.
The interpreter does not own the window, the renderer, or the game loop. The sink draws
through whatever renderer the host already initialized. akbasic_sink_init_akgl() takes the
renderer; it does not create one.
Call akgl_error_init() before anything else in libakgl. New in libakgl 0.1.0
(deps/libakgl/src/error.c): it reserves the 256–260 status band and registers a name for
each AKGL_ERR_* code. akgl_game_init() calls it first, but we drive subsystems directly and
never call akgl_game_init(), so it is ours to call. Skip it and every AKGL_ERR_* that
reaches a stack trace prints "Unknown Error" — which is exactly the defect the upstream commit
found in game.c, where an SDL failure five lines ahead of the old registration site was
guaranteed to be unnamed. It is idempotent, so calling it from both akbasic_sink_init_akgl()
and a host that already did is harmless.
PASS its result; a range collision is an initialization failure, not a warning.
Known gap: libakgl has no text-measurement call — the Go code needs
font.SizeUTF8("A") (basicruntime.go:96) to compute maxCharsW/maxCharsH, and there is no
akgl_text_* equivalent. File it in deps/libakgl/TODO.md before writing a workaround.
See §7.
Acceptance: tests/sink_akgl.c against the offscreen renderer harness, or — if that harness
does not exist yet — a known-failing test plus a libakgl TODO entry saying so.
4. Remaining work: language completion (goal 2)
The work queue is the "What Isn't Implemented" list in deps/basicinterpret/README.md.
Each verb is: table row (§1.1) → parse handler if it needs one → exec handler → unit test →
a new .bas/.txt pair. Both kinds of test; they answer different questions.
Order by what unblocks the most, and by what does not need libakgl to grow first:
| Group | Verbs | Blocked on |
|---|---|---|
| A. Structure | DO, LOOP, WHILE, UNTIL, ON, BEGIN, BEND, END |
nothing — reuses waitingForCommand |
| B. Housekeeping | NEW, CLR, CONT, RESTORE, RENUMBER, SWAP, TRON, TROFF, HELP |
nothing |
| C. Errors | TRAP, RESUME, ER, ERR |
needs a BASIC-visible error object |
| D. Strings/format | USING, PUDEF, WIDTH, CHAR |
nothing |
| E. Console | GET, GETKEY, SCNCLR, LOCATE, WINDOW, KEY, SLEEP, WAIT, TI |
sink + libakgl input |
| F. Disk | DOPEN, DCLOSE, APPEND, RECORD, HEADER, COLLECT, BACKUP, COPY, CONCAT, RENAME, SCRATCH, DIRECTORY, CATALOG, DCLEAR, DVERIFY, SAVE, LOAD, VERIFY, BLOAD, BSAVE, BOOT |
aksl_f* only; no new akgl |
| G. Graphics | GRAPHIC, DRAW, BOX, CIRCLE, PAINT, COLOR, SCALE, SSHAPE, GSHAPE, LOCATE |
libakgl immediate-mode draw API — file it |
| H. Sprites | SPRITE, MOVSPR, SPRCOLOR, SPRDEF, SPRSAV, COLLISION |
libakgl sprite/actor API — check before filing |
| I. Audio | PLAY, SOUND, ENVELOPE, FILTER, VOL, TEMPO |
libakgl has no mixer-backed audio API — file it |
| J. Machine | SYS, FETCH, STASH, POKE/PEEK variants |
nothing |
Out of scope, and staying that way — the reference marks these as incompatible with a
modern PC and that reasoning stands: BANK (no bank switching), FAST (irrelevant CPU speed
control), MONITOR (no machine-language monitor).
Also on the queue, from the reference's own defect list:
- Multiple statements per line (
10 PRINT A$ : REM ...). TheCOLONtoken exists (basicscanner.go:40) and nothing consumes it. This changes the parser's statement loop and should be done before group A, becauseDO/LOOPbodies read badly without it. - Array references in parameter lists (
READ A$(0), B#) currently fail to parse. Fix inargumentList.
5. Deliberate deviations from the reference
Keep this list current. Each of these changes structure without changing observable output, and each one has to be defensible against the golden suite.
- Reflection → static dispatch table (§1.1).
- Go maps → fixed open-addressed tables (§1.3).
- Unbounded
new(BasicEnvironment)→ pool with release (§1.4). - Hardcoded stdout+SDL mirror → text sink backend (§1.5).
run()owns the process →step()/ boundedrun()(§1.6).panic()→FAIL_RETURN; no library call terminates the process (§1.6).debug.PrintStack()on parse error → theakerrstack trace only (§3.1 of the original plan).BasicEnvironment.eval_clone_identifiersdeleted as dead state (§4.2 of the original plan).BasicValue.nameandBasicEnvironment.update()deleted as dead: nothing ever writes the field a non-empty string, andupdate()— its only reader — has no callers.- The
DEF-statement bootstrap is gone. The reference declares every builtin by running a BASIC program ofDEFlines through the interpreter at startup and then nulling out the expressions (basicruntime_functions.go:14); here a builtin's name, arity and handler are a row in the dispatch table, andMOD,SPCandSTRare ordinary native handlers. This removes the need to run the interpreter before the interpreter is ready. - Undefined behaviour the reference reaches by a defined route is refused rather than inherited: a shift count outside 0..63, a negative string multiplier, and integer division by zero all raise. Go defines all three (or panics); C does not. No golden case exercises any of them, so observable behaviour is unchanged.
CommandEXITclears the pendingNEXTwait before popping. The reference does not, which leaves the parent waiting for aNEXTthat never arrives (§6 item 8) — in C that is a hang rather than a misbehaviour, and no golden case depends on it.
6. Reference defects — ported faithfully, fix them deliberately
These are real bugs in deps/basicinterpret. Port the behaviour first so the golden suite
passes and the port is provably faithful, then fix each one in its own commit with a test that
asserts the correct contract. Until fixed, the correct-contract test lives in
AKBASIC_KNOWN_FAILING_TESTS.
basicvariable.go:176—toString()testslen(self.values) == 0and then indexesself.values[0]. Inverted condition; on an empty variable it panics, and on a non-empty one it returns the "not implemented for arrays" string. Consequence:PRINTof a scalar through this path is wrong. Fix:if ( count == 1 ).basicvariable.go:108—setBooleanbuilds a value withvaluetype: TYPE_STRING. Consequence: a boolean stored in a variable reads back as a string with an emptystringval. Fix:TYPE_BOOLEAN.basicenvironment.go:157—stopWaiting(command)ignorescommandand clears the wait unconditionally. Consequence: an inner block can clear an outer block's wait. Fix: compare before clearing, and error on a mismatch.basicvalue.go:181—mathPlusmutatesselfin place whenself.mutableis true, while every other operator always clones. Consequence:A# + 1can modifyA#depending on where the value came from. This one is high blast radius; it interacts witheval_clone_identifiersand withCommandNEXT's increment (basicruntime_commands.go:663), which relies on the mutation. Do not fix it beforeFOR/NEXThas full test coverage.basicvalue.go:191and siblings — every binary operator adds both of the right-hand operand's numeric fields:rval.intval + int64(rval.floatval). Works only because the unused field is always zero. Consequence: none today; it is a landmine for any future value that carries both.basicvalue.go, all comparisons —destis cloned fromself, so the resulting boolean inheritsself.name. Consequence: a comparison result can be written back to the wrong variable throughenvironment.update().basicruntime_commands.go:484—CommandIFwalksexpr.rightto the end of the chain looking for aTHENcommand, then dereferencesexpr.rightafter the loop guaranteed it isnil. Consequence: the "Malformed IF statement" check is unreachable and nestedIF ... THEN ... ELSEis unverified.basicruntime_commands.go:669—CommandEXITpops the environment withoutstopWaiting, leaving the parent waiting on aNEXTthat will never come.basicruntime.go:149—newVariable()andBasicRuntime.variables[MAX_VARIABLES]are dead; variables live in the environment's map. Do not port them.basicgrammar.go:224—newLiteralIntselects base 8 whenever the lexeme starts with0. Consequence:PRINT 08is a parse error andPRINT 010prints 8. Commodore BASIC has no octal literals. Fix: base 10 unless prefixed0x.basicruntime.go:121/basicparser_commands.go:124— environments are never freed. Addressed structurally by §1.4; no separate fix needed, but the C pool will exhaust where Go merely leaked, sotests/environment_scope.c's exhaustion assertion matters.
Found during the port
Five more, none of which the reference's own corpus catches. Each is reproduced faithfully,
pinned by an assertion in the relevant unit test, and asserted correctly in
tests/known_reference_defects.c.
-
basicparser.go:329—subtraction()returns after one operator whereaddition()loops, so1 - 2 - 3computes1 - 2and abandons the rest of the line. The remaining- 3is left in the token stream and the statement loop picks it up as a second statement, which evaluates and is discarded. Consequence: a chain of two or more subtractions silently produces the wrong answer. This is the highest-impact item on the list — it is a wrong result, not a refused one. The same shape appears inexponent(), so2 ^ 3 ^ 2has it too. Fix: make both loop the wayaddition()does. Pinned intests/parser_expressions.c. -
basicparser.go:565— a unary-minus argument inflates a function's arity count. The counter walks the.rightchain, and a unary leaf keeps its operand on.right, soABS(-9)is counted as two arguments and refused with "function ABS takes 1 arguments, received 2". Consequence: no builtin can be called with a negative literal. The corpus hides it —sgn.basassigns-1to a variable first. Fix: count only the top-level argument chain, not whatever a leaf hangs off.right. Pinned intests/runtime_evaluate.c. -
basicscanner.go:272—matchNextCharreturns without setting a token type when it cannot peek past the end of the line, so a comparison operator in the final column is silently dropped.A# =produces one token, not two. Consequence: a line ending in a bare<,>or=loses it, and the parse error that follows points at the wrong place. Fix: setfalsetypebefore returning on the peek failure. Pinned intests/scanner_tokens.c. -
basicscanner.go:318— hex literals do not survive the scanner.matchNumberallowsxthrough but not the hex digits after it, so0xfflexes as0xandffis scanned as a separate identifier. Consequence: the base-16 branch innewLiteralInt(basicgrammar.go:224) is unreachable, and the README's hex support does not exist. Fix: oncexhas been seen, accept[0-9a-fA-F]. Pinned intests/scanner_tokens.c. -
basicscanner.go:349— the "Reserved word in variable name" check never fires. The lexeme still carries its type suffix when the keyword tables are searched, soPRINT$misses every table and becomes an ordinary string variable. Consequence: the diagnostic is dead code andPRINT$ = 1is accepted. Fix: strip the suffix before the lookup. Pinned intests/scanner_tokens.c.
7. Filing gaps against libakgl
When phase 7 or phase 8 needs something libakgl does not have, stop and file it in
deps/libakgl/TODO.md in that file's numbered prose style: what the BASIC verb requires, what
the akgl_* entry point should look like, and what tests would cover it. Growing libakgl to
serve the interpreter is a wanted outcome, not a detour.
Known gaps, to be filed as they are reached:
- Text measurement. No
akgl_text_*call returns the pixel size of a string in a font.PRINTwrapping, the cursor, andWIDTHall need it. Blocks 7.1. - Immediate-mode drawing.
src/draw.cis at 0% coverage and there is no public API for lines, boxes, circles or flood fill. Blocks group G. - Audio. There is no mixer-backed API at all. Blocks group I entirely.
- Console input.
GET/GETKEYneed a non-blocking keystroke read that does not require the interpreter to own the SDL event loop. Blocks part of group E.
8. Status
The port is done. The C interpreter reproduces the Go reference byte for byte across its entire test corpus and passes clean under ASan and UBSan.
| Gate | Result |
|---|---|
ctest |
59/59 — 41 golden cases, 17 unit tests, 1 known-failing |
| Golden corpus | 41/41 byte-exact, driven in place from the submodule |
| ASan + UBSan | 59/59 |
| Line coverage | 92.3% (2823/3058) — above the 90% gate |
| Function coverage | 96.9% (221/228) |
| Warnings | none under -Wall -Wextra |
Branch coverage reads 17.3% and is not a target, for the reason libakgl/TODO.md and
libakstdlib/TODO.md both give: the akerror control-flow macros expand into large branch trees
at every call site, most of them unreachable in normal operation. Track line and function
coverage.
Dependency baseline:
| Submodule | Version | Notes |
|---|---|---|
deps/libakerror |
1.0.0 | Private ownership-enforced status registry. akbasic reserves 512–767 in akbasic_error_register(). Does not namespace its coverage target when embedded — worked around in our CMakeLists.txt. |
deps/libakstdlib |
0.1.0 | soname libakstdlib.so.0.1. AKSL_VERSION_CHECK() asserted in tests/version_check.c. Its aksl_ato* family is banned here — see §1.9. |
deps/libakgl |
0.1.0 | Migrated to the 1.0.0 registry and owns 256–260. Not yet linked: AKBASIC_WITH_AKGL defaults OFF and src/sink_akgl.c does not exist. |
What remains, in priority order:
- §3 — the akgl text sink. Blocked on
libakglhaving no text-measurement call; that gap needs filing indeps/libakgl/TODO.mdbefore any workaround is written. - §4 — the language completion work queue. Groups A, B, D, F and J need nothing from
libakgland can start immediately. Multiple statements per line (theCOLONtoken exists and nothing consumes it) should come first, becauseDO/LOOPreads badly without it. - §6 items 12–16 — the defects the port uncovered. Item 12 is the one that produces a wrong answer rather than a refused one, and should be fixed first.