poetics

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1. What is Poetics?

A native implementation of CoffeeScript [1] that runs on the Rubinius VM [2].

Q. Whence comes the name Poetics?

A. Poetics is a partial anagram of the word CoffeeScript. It is also a nod to Jeremy Ashkenas, the author of CoffeeScript, and his interest in code as literature.

Q. Why a native implementation?

A. CoffeeScript is an interesting language in its own right. Rather than merely being a syntax layer on top of Javascript, and bound to expressing its semantics in those of Javascript, it deserves its own implementation. Many of the reasons to use CoffeeScript in Node.js would also apply to using this native implementation.

2. License

Poetics is MIT licensed. See the LICENSE file.

3. Installation

First, install Rubinius:

1. Using RVM (http://rvm.beginrescueend.com).

rvm install rbx

2. Or directly (http://rubini.us/doc/en/what-is-rubinius/).

Second, install Poetics:

rbx -S gem install poetics

4. Running Poetics

Poetics provides a REPL for exploratory programming or runs CoffeeScript scripts.

rbx -S poetics -h

The REPL presently just parses code and returns an S-Expression representation:

$ rbx -S poetics
> 42
[:number, 42.0, 1, 1]
> "hello, y'all"
[:string, "hello, y'all", 1, 1]
>

To exit the REPL hit CTRL + d.

5. Getting Help

Poetics is a work in progress. If you encounter trouble, please file an issue at https://github.com/brixen/poetics/issues

6. Contributing

If you find Poetics interesting and would like to help out, fork the project on Github and submit a pull request.

7. People

Poetics was created by Brian Ford (brixen) to force him to really learn Javascript and CoffeeScript.