RuScript, Ruby Interpreter in JavaScript (1) The Project

When I have free time, I’m working on:

https://github.com/ajlopez/RuScript

I’m writing the code following the TDD (Test-Driven Development) workflow (see commit history)

The idea is to have a Ruby interpreter written in JavaScript, so it can run at the browser, or at the server with Node.js. I’m not implementing a compiler yet, because I want to do “baby steps”, and because Ruby semantic could be different to JavaScript one. Ie, the resolution of methods, or check if a variable is local to a function or not, are examples of divergences between the languages. So, I decided to write an interpreter.

I’m applying “dog fooding”: the parser is written using:

https://github.com/ajlopez/SimpleGrammar

I’m applying SimpleGrammar in other projects, like RustScript. There is an implementation in C#, too, named GrammGen). A fragment of the defined rules for RuScript parser:

// Expression Level 1
get('Expression1').generate('Expression'),
get('Expression1', 'Plus', 'Expression0')
    .generate('Expression1', function (values) { return new AddExpression(values[0], values[2]); }),
get('Expression1', 'Minus', 'Expression0')
    .generate('Expression1', function (values) { return new SubtractExpression(values[0], values[2]); }),

// Expression Level 0
get('Expression0').generate('Expression1'),
get('Expression0', 'Multiply', 'Term')
    .generate('Expression0', function (values) { return new MultiplyExpression(values[0], values[2]); }),
get('Expression0', 'Divide', 'Term')
    .generate('Expression0', function (values) { return new DivideExpression(values[0], values[2]); }),

// Term
get('Term').generate('Expression0'),
get('Term', 'LeftBracket', 'ExpressionList', 'RightBracket')
    .generate('Term', function (values) { return new IndexedExpression(values[0], values[2]); }),
get('Integer').generate('Term'),
get('@@', 'Name').generate('ClassVariable', 
    function (values) { return new ClassVariableExpression(values[1].getName()); }),
get('@', 'Name').generate('InstanceVariable', 
    function (values) { return new InstanceVariableExpression(values[1].getName()); }),
get('Name').generate('Term'),
get('InstanceVariable').generate('Term'),
get('ClassVariable').generate('Term'),
get('String').generate('Term'),
get('Array').generate('Term'),
get('LeftParenthesis', 'Expression', 'RightParenthesis')
    .generate('Expression0', function (values) { return values[1]; }),
get('LeftBracket', 'RightBracket')
    .generate('Array', function (values) { return new ArrayExpression([]); }),
get('LeftBracket', 'ExpressionList', 'RightBracket')
    .generate('Array', function (values) { return new ArrayExpression(values[1]); }),

For each discovered element, the grammar is building an expression, that can be evaluate using a context. A context has the values of the visible variables. Example:

function NameExpression(name) {
    this.evaluate = function (context) {
        var value = context.getValue(name);
        
        if (typeof value == 'function')
            return value();
        
        return value;
    };
    
    this.getName = function () { return name; };
    
    this.setValue = function (context, value) {
        context.setLocalValue(name, value);
    }
}

function InstanceVariableExpression(name) {
    this.evaluate = function (context) {
        if (!context.$self.$vars)
            return null;
            
        return context.$self.$vars[name];
    };
    
    this.getName = function () { return name; };
    
    this.setValue = function (context, value) {
        if (!context.$self.$vars)
            context.$self.$vars = { };
            
        context.$self.$vars[name] = value;
    }
}

function ClassVariableExpression(name) {
    this.evaluate = function (context) {
        if (!context.$self.$class.$vars)
            return null;
            
        return context.$self.$class.$vars[name];
    };
    
    this.getName = function () { return name; };
    
    this.setValue = function (context, value) {
        if (!context.$self.$class.$vars)
            context.$self.$class.$vars = { };
            
        context.$self.$class.$vars[name] = value;
    }
}

function ConstantExpression(value) {
    this.evaluate = function () {
        return value;
    };
}

I have access to JavaScript features from Ruby, example, a test:

exports['Evaluate JavaScript global name'] = function (test) {
    global.myglobal = 42;
    var context = contexts.createContext();
    var parser = parsers.createParser("js.myglobal");
    //parser.options({ log: true });
    var expr = parser.parse("Expression");
    var result = expr.value.evaluate(context);
    test.equal(result, 42);
}

The js namespaces allowed the access to JavaScript defined variables, and all its ecosystem, at the browser or at the server.

I want to share my advances at RubyConf 2014 Argentina.

Next steps: access to Node.js require, web site examples using Node.js/Express, console examples, browser examples, etc.

Stay tuned!

Angel “Java” Lopez

http://www.ajlopez.com

http://twitter.com/ajlopez