Getting Started

Prerequisites

Windows

Python 3 with pip
Visual Studio Build Tools

Linux

Python 3 with pip
LLVM toolchain (Clang + LLD + glibc)

macOS

Python 3 with pip
Xcode
For x86_64: NASM assembler

Install Script

You can use the install script to automatically download the latest release, extract it to $HOME/.banjo/, and add it to the PATH environment variable.

Windows (Powershell)

Invoke-WebRequest https://raw.githubusercontent.com/chnoblouch/banjo-lang/main/getbanjo.py | Select-Object -Expand Content | python

Linux and macOS

curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/chnoblouch/banjo-lang/main/getbanjo.py | python3

Manual Installation

Download the Banjo toolchain from GitHub Releases
Unzip the archive somewhere
Add banjo-{arch}-{os}/bin to your PATH environment variable

Creating a Project

Enter the directory where you want your project to be created and run banjo new hello-world. This will create a project directory called hello-world. Enter this directory and run banjo run.

The output should look something like this:

Setting up toolchain for: x86_64-windows-msvc
Locating MSVC toolchain...
  Found vswhere: C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio\Installer\vswhere.exe
  Found Visual Studio installation: C:\Program Files (x86)\Microsoft Visual Studio\2022\BuildTools
  Using MSVC version 14.38.33130
  Found Windows SDK: C:\Program Files (x86)\Windows Kits\10\
  Using Windows SDK version 10.0.22621.0
Compiling...
Linking...
Build finished! (0.67 seconds)
Running...
Hello, World! 

You have built and run your first Banjo program! Now try editing the source in src/main.bnj.

VS Code Integration

The toolchain ships with a language server (banjo-lsp) that can be used from any editor. For VS Code you can download and install the banjo-vscode extension from GitHub. After installing the banjo-language.vsix file in VS Code, open a Banjo project directory. The extension will apply syntax highlighting to your code and provide name lookup and completion.