ZL is a C compatible and C++ like programming language that focuses on extensiblilty and giving the programmer control over how high-level constructs (such as classes) are implemented.

ZL was original developed on Ubuntu 10.04, but it should work with any Linux system. (For Ubuntu 12.04 please see the note near the end of file if you run until problems.) Other Unix-like systems may work.

ZL uses the Boehm-Demers-Weiser conservative garbage collector, which can be found at http://www.hpl.hp.com/personal/Hans_Boehm/gc/. It is also available Ubuntu under the package names libgc1c2 and libgc-dev.

Also, in order to produce executable code, ZL requires a modified version of gcc. If this is a release than a patch file should have been provided. Most of the development has been done using gcc-4.4.0 however later versions of gcc-4.4.* should work provided that the patch file applies cleanly. Download gcc 4.4.0 from ftp://gcc.gnu.org/pub/gcc/releases/gcc-4.4.0 (gcc-core is all that is required) and apply the patch gcc-4.4.0-zl.patch. When configuring make sure you enable the zls language:

tar xf gcc-core-4.4.0.tar.bz2 mv gcc-4.4.0-src mkdir gcc-4.4.0 mv gcc-4.4.0-src gcc-4.4.0/src pushd gcc-4.4.0/src patch -p0 < PATH_TO_PATCH/gcc-4.4.0-zl.patch # should apply cleanly popd mkdir gcc-4.4.0/obj cd gcc-4.4.0/obj ../src/configure --enable-languages=zls # --prefix=/opt/gcc-4.4-zl/ make bootstrap make install sudo ln -s /opt/gcc-4.4-zl/bin/gcc /usr/local/bin/zls

The latest version of zls is also available in github at https://github.com/kevina/zl-gcc. Just checkout master and follow the instructions above, but skip the patching part as the git repository includes the full source.

ZL Build instructions:

When checking out from git for the first time:

./autogen

./configure make

no need to install, in fact the install target is empty

use "make fake-install" to install a link to to zlc so you can

easily compile zl programs

To test ZL, make sure "zls" in your path and then: make -C test test

To create executable use the "zlc" perl script, which acts as a drop-in replacement for cc/gcc and c++/g++.

Ubuntu 12.04 notes:

To build (both gcc and zl) on Ubuntu 12.04 you might need to do something similar to

export LIBRARY_PATH=/usr/lib/$(gcc -print-multiarch) export C_INCLUDE_PATH=/usr/include/$(gcc -print-multiarch) export CPLUS_INCLUDE_PATH=/usr/include/$(gcc -print-multiarch)

as there is a known problem that puts the files in a non standard location (http://gcc.gnu.org/ml/gcc/2012-02/msg00314.html).

Copyright (C) Kevin Atkinson 2012

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the terms of the GNU Lesser General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation; either version 2.1 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.

This program is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. See the GNU Lesser General Public License for more details.

You should have received a copy of the GNU Lesser General Public License along with this program; if not, write to the Free Software Foundation, Inc., 51 Franklin Street, Fifth Floor, Boston, MA 02110-1301 USA or see http://www.gnu.org/licenses/lgpl-2.1.html.