Example Zig

This repository provides a simple Hello-World example for the zig language, which in recent times has become quite a hot option as a simpler alternative to Rust and C++.

Installation of Zig

• Unpack an appropriate distribution from https://ziglang.org/download to an appropriate location on your machine.

• Add the directory in which the zig-binary lies to your system PATH:

  touch ${HOME}/.bash_profile # ensures this exists
  echo "# path for zig" >> ${HOME}/.bash_profile
  echo "export PATH=\"/path/to/your zig binaries:\${PATH}\";" >> ${HOME}/.bash_profile
  

  for linux. Or edit the file directly, adding the lines

  ...
  # path for zig
  export PATH="/path/to/your zig binaries:${PATH}";
  

  For windows, do this via the system environment variables (which requires admin access); or just install bash for windows and simply perform the above.

• Clone the ZLS (zig langauge server) repository https://github.com/zigtools/zls and run

  zig build
  

  This will generate a folder zig-out/bin. Copy just the binary from here to the same path where your zig-compiler binary is stored. (Otherwise choose your own location and add this to PATH.)

Intellisense

If you are using VSCode, install the Zig Language extension. For this to work, it needs to detect your ZLS binary.

Open the User Settings JSON (e.g. via command palette) and add the following attributes to the dictionary:

{
    ...
    // NOTE: remove the .exe extension for windows
    "zig.path": "/path/to/your zig binaries/zig.exe",
    "zig.zls.zigLibPath": "/path/to/your zig binaries/lib",
    "zig.zls.path": "/path/to/your ZLS binaries/zls.exe",
    // optional
    "zig.zls.buildOnSaveStep": "",
    "zig.checkForUpdate": false,
    "zig.zls.checkForUpdate": false,
}

Build and run

Install the justfile tool. Run

just setup # only needed once - then adjust the created .env file
just build # compiles the binary
just run {args} # runs without the compiled binary
just run-exe {args} # runs the compiled binary

NOTE: The hello-world example was taken from https://zig-by-example.com/hello-world