Getting Started

This guide walks you through installing Zamin from source, verifying your setup, writing your first script, and organizing larger projects.

Prerequisites

Before building Zamin, make sure you have the following installed on your system:

• Rust 1.80+ — Zamin is written in Rust. Install it via rustup:

curl --proto '=https' --tlsv1.2 -sSf https://sh.rustup.rs | sh

• Git — Required to clone the repository.
• C compiler — GCC or Clang on Linux/macOS, MSVC on Windows. Needed for native extensions and optional features.

Installation

Clone and build

Clone the repository and build Zamin in release mode:

git clone https://github.com/young-developer90/zamin.git
cd zamin
cargo build --release

The compiled binary will be at target/release/zamin. Add it to your PATH for convenient access:

export PATH="$PWD/target/release:$PATH"

Optional features

Zamin supports optional feature flags that enable additional capabilities:

cargo build --release --features opencv

Feature	Description
opencv	Enable OpenCV bindings for image processing and computer vision
luna	Enable the Luna GUI toolkit for Linux
python	Enable Python interop for calling Python libraries directly

You can combine multiple features:

cargo build --release --features "opencv,luna,python"

Verify Installation

Check that Zamin is installed and working:

$ zamin version
zamin 1.7.3

Launch the interactive REPL to confirm the runtime is functional:

$ zamin repl
Zamin 1.7.3 (interactive)
Type "help" for more information.
zamin>

Your First Script

Create a file called hello.zamin with the following content:

print("Hello, Zamin!")

Run it:

$ zamin run hello.zamin
Hello, Zamin!

Let's try something a bit more interesting. Replace the contents of hello.zamin with:

func greet(name) {
    print("Hello, {name}!");
}

func fibonacci(n) {
    if n <= 1 {
        return n;
    }
    return fibonacci(n - 1) + fibonacci(n - 2);
}

greet("World");

for i in 0..10 {
    print("fib({i}) = {fibonacci(i)}");
}

Using the REPL

The Zamin REPL is great for experimenting with language features and testing code snippets:

$ zamin repl
Zamin 1.7.3 (interactive)
Type "help" for more information.
zamin> print("Hello!")
Hello!
zamin> 2 + 2
4
zamin> func add(a, b) { a + b }
zamin> add(10, 20)
30
zamin> [1, 2, 3].map(func(x) { x * 2 })
[2, 4, 6]
zamin> .exit

Project Setup

For larger applications, use Zamin's built-in project scaffolding:

$ zamin new myproject
Created new project "myproject"
  src/main.zamin
  zamin.json

This generates a project directory with the following structure:

myproject/
├── zamin.json
└── src/
    └── main.zamin

zamin.json

The zamin.json file defines your project's metadata and build configuration:

{
  "name": "myproject",
  "version": "1.0.0",
  "entry": "src/main.zamin",
  "dependencies": [],
  "features": []
}

src/main.zamin

The entry point for your application:

print("Welcome to myproject!")

Build and run your project:

$ cd myproject
$ zamin run
Welcome to myproject!

For more details on project management, see the Project CLI reference.