bark is a new programming language that’s several years in the making.

Unlike Slim, which had a clear application in mind from the start, bark began as a purely syntactical challenge. I defined behavior rules like the left-to-right process semantics, output of one function as input to the next, etc… and wanted to see if I could make them work.

This idea first came to mind around ten years ago. Over the years, bark would randomly resurface and some unresolved syntax issue would find its resolution. I wasn’t close enough to a complete syntax to attempt implementation, even though I did try couple of times with both Go and Rust, but those didn’t go far because I’d quickly run into an unresolved issue with the syntax.

Eventually the syntax felt well-defined enough to try again. That’s where we are today.

Now that it actually works, I have some thoughts on where bark might be useful. I’m also working through Rosetta Code examples and adding them to bark’s examples. This has been a great exercise for finding where bark falls short and where additional built-in functions or some functional tweaks could simplify things.

I’ll keep the bark website focused the core language, but as I mentioned, I have some thoughts now on where bark might be useful. I’ll post those thought exercises here - I’ll actually use this site! (crazy)