Getting started meant cloning the repository, bootstrapping a compiler and
learning a task runner called `x`. That is a contributor's workflow handed to
everyone who wants to try the language.
Installing is now one command:
curl -fsSL https://workshopsoft.pages.workshopsoft.io/ludic/install.sh | sh
install.sh puts a complete toolchain — compiler, CLI, engine runtime, bundled
ludic.* packages, formatter, language server — in ~/.ludic and adds it to PATH.
Prebuilt artifacts are checksum-verified; where a platform has none, or the
release predates this layout, it bootstraps from the compiler's own IR seed with
clang. The docs site publishes the script beside the pages that quote it, so the
page and the script can never come from different releases.
`x` becomes `ludic`, and the surface splits by audience. A user of the language
sees `new`, `run`, `build`, `test`, `add`, `fmt`, `lsp`, `doctor`, `upgrade`;
`ludic new` scaffolds a project that builds and plays as it stands. Everything
the toolchain repo needs moved under `ludic dev` — build, test, reseed,
bootstrap-cfree, docs-gen, release — unchanged apart from the namespace. Those
tasks read arguments one position further along, so dispatch_dev sets a shift
and commands use arg_n()/arg_total() rather than each knowing its own depth.
Release artifacts become complete install roots (bin/ beside runtime/, packages/
and VERSION) rather than bare binaries, which is what the installer unpacks.
`ludic dev test` asserts the whole shape: it stages an install, puts it on PATH
with no LUDIC_HOME, and runs new -> build -> test through it.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
|
||
|---|---|---|
| .. | ||
| gradle/wrapper | ||
| src | ||
| build.gradle.kts | ||
| gradle.properties | ||
| gradlew | ||
| gradlew.bat | ||
| README.md | ||
| settings.gradle.kts | ||
Ludic for JetBrains IDEs
Works in IntelliJ IDEA (Community and Ultimate), CLion, GoLand, PyCharm, Rider,
WebStorm — anything on the IntelliJ Platform 2023.2 through 2026.2
(since-build 232, until-build 262.*).
until-build 262 is deliberately ahead of the newest released platform — 2025.3
is build 253, and no 262 IDE exists yet. That headroom is the point: an
until-build pinned to today's IDE gets the plugin auto-disabled the moment a
user upgrades.
Two things are machine-checked rather than assumed, because a plugin that packages cleanly can still fail to load:
./gradlew verifyPluginruns JetBrains' own Plugin Verifier over the built artifact against 2025.3 and reports Compatible, with no deprecated or scheduled-for-removal API usages../gradlew runIdeboots a real IDEA 2025.3 with the plugin installed. The sandbox log line to look for isLoaded custom plugins: LSP4IJ (0.20.1), Ludic (1.0.0)in.intellijPlatform/sandbox/Ludic/IC-2025.3/log/idea.log.
If the plugin does not appear in Settings -> Plugins after installing, the
cause is almost always that the IDE's build number is outside
since-build..until-build. IntelliJ installs the declared dependency (LSP4IJ)
from Marketplace first and only then rejects the incompatible plugin, so the
symptom is "LSP4IJ got installed, mine did not". Check Help -> About for the
build number and widen pluginUntilBuild in gradle.properties to match.
Building
Gradle must run on JDK 17–21. A newer JDK fails with a bare version number as the error message, which is not obvious the first time you see it:
export JAVA_HOME=$(/usr/libexec/java_home -v 21) # macOS
cd tools/editors/jetbrains
./gradlew buildPlugin # -> build/distributions/Ludic-1.0.0.zip
./gradlew runIde # try it in a sandbox IDE
The first build downloads an IntelliJ IDEA Community distribution (over 1 GB), so expect it to take a while; later builds take seconds. Once the cache is warm,
LUDIC_TEST_JETBRAINS=1 bin/ludic dev test-tools
includes the plugin build in the toolchain's own test run.
Install the zip with Settings -> Plugins -> ⚙ -> Install Plugin from Disk. LSP4IJ is a required dependency; the IDE offers to install it for you.
Settings
Settings -> Languages & Frameworks -> Ludic — the path to ludic-lsp and to
ludicc. Both default to bin/ under the project root, which is where
bin/ludic dev tools puts them.