README.md

• What is Zig
• Setup Zig
  • Requirements
  • Installing Zig
• Building Newth
  • Configure build system
    • Zig
      • Optimize
      • Target
    • Newth Options
  • Build Newth

What is Zig

Zig is a low level programming language with a focus on memory safety and low friction cross-compilation and is its own build system via its "comptime" feature. Because Zigs toolchain also contains C compiler it can be used to build C projects.

Setup Zig

Requirements

To build Newth with Zig you will need the following:

• Zig v0.13

Tip: Zig v0.13 is considered an unstable API meaning newer versions may break backwards compatibility

Installing Zig

Installation instructions for Zig differ depending on the build machines operating system. Some common operating systems are listed here. If the required operating system or package manager is not listed visit https://ziglang.org/download/ and look for a manual build.

Building Newth

Configure build system

Zig

Optimize

Zig has several optimization levels. They are as follows:

Optimization Level	Description
-Doptimize=Debug	Default. Gives as much debugging infomation as possible at the cost of binary size and speed
-Doptimize=ReleaseSafe	A release build with runtime safety checks build in at the cost of binary size and speed
-Doptimize=ReleaseFast	A release build with no runtime safety checks and a emphasis on execution speed
-Doptimize=ReleaseSmall	A release build with no runtime safety checks and a emphasis on smaller binary sizes

Target

As mentioned earlier Zig is a cross-compiler. This means it's possible to build Newth for one system on another. While this in not unique to Zig it's unique in its easy of setup and use.

When targeting a system other than native Zig needs to know which system that is with a triplet, for example:

Triplet	Description
-Dtarget=x86-linux-gnu	A 32-bit GNU/Linux PC
-Dtarget=x86_64-linux-gnu	A typical 64-bit GNU/Linux PC
-Dtarget=x86_64-windows-gnu	A typical 64-bit Windows 10 PC
-Dtarget=riscv64-linux-musl	RISC-V 64-bit MUSL/Linux

Tip: run zig targets to see all possible combinations

Newth Options

Newth has several configuration options that change the behaviour of the program itself. They are as follows:

Option	Description
-Dpoll=true	Use poll() instead of select() in th
-Dreadline=false	Disable GNU Readline support in dl
-Dwsock1=true	Enable WinSock 1.1 support for a truly portable Windows 32-bit binary

Build Newth

Run zig build in the directory containing build.zig to build the project. Binaries called th and dl will be made in the zig-out subdirectory followed by another directory with the target triplets name. Don't forget to append any desired build options to the command.