Vow

Vow is a programming language designed for a machine author. Its guiding rule: every function should be checkable from its signature alone. Effects are declared, contracts are proved by the Z3 SMT solver at compile time, and nothing depends on counting or on context far away.

fn is_sorted(xs: List<Int>) -> Bool do
  return forall i in 0..len(xs): forall j in i..len(xs): xs[i] <= xs[j]
end fn is_sorted

fn search(xs: List<Int>, target: Int) -> Int
  requires is_sorted(xs)
  ensures (-1 <= result) and (result < len(xs))
  ensures (result >= 0) implies (xs[result] == target)
  ensures (result == -1) implies (forall i in 0..len(xs): xs[i] != target)
do
  var lo = 0
  var hi = len(xs)
  while lo < hi
    invariant (0 <= lo) and (lo <= hi) and (hi <= len(xs))
    invariant forall i in 0..lo: xs[i] < target
    invariant forall i in hi..len(xs): xs[i] > target
    decreases hi - lo
  do
    let mid = lo + ((hi - lo) / 2)
    let x = xs[mid]                    // proved in bounds: no runtime check
    if x == target then
      return mid
    elif x < target then
      set lo = mid + 1
    else
      set hi = mid
    end if
  end while
  return -1
end fn search

If this compiles, binary search is correct for every sorted input: a returned index holds the target, -1 means the target is absent, and the loop terminates.

What makes it different

• Contracts are proved, not tested. Refinement types (Int where it >= 0), requires, ensures, loop invariants, quantified properties (forall i in 0..len(xs): ...), termination measures, index bounds and division by zero are proof obligations. When a proof fails you get a counterexample:

  index.vow:3:10: error: cannot prove index in bounds: 0 <= 0 < len(xs)
      counterexample: len(xs) = 0
  

• Effects are part of the signature. A function is pure unless it says uses console, uses fs or uses proc, and callers must declare a superset.

• No precedence, no counting. a + b * c is an error; write a + (b * c). Every block has a labelled end (end fn search), so a missing delimiter fails locally.

• Named arguments, no shadowing, no null, no exceptions, no implicit conversions.

• Mutable value semantics. Values are immutable; var and inout parameters give you mutation without aliasing.

• Typed holes. Write ?name and the compiler reports the expected type, the variables in scope and every fact it knows at that point.

• Content-addressed verification. A function is re-verified only when its body, or the contracts of what it calls, change.

Standard library

import "std/text.vow" gives verified text utilities (find, split, lines, trim, replace, starts_with, ...), each with a contract the verifier can use, and import "std/json.vow" as json reads and writes JSON. Any file can be imported as a module (import "geo.vow" as geo, then geo.dist(...)) or by name (import "std/text.vow" (split, trim)), and private declarations stay in their file. Packages are git repositories pinned to a commit in vow.pkg (vowc add shapes <git URL>), imported as import "@shapes/shapes.vow" as shapes, and verified with the program that uses them.

Self-hosting

The compiler is written in Vow (compiler/, about 6,000 lines) and verified by itself: every index, slice and refinement in it is proved, with no runtime-checked escape hatches. make bootstrap rebuilds it with itself, starting from the C seed, and checks the fixpoint: the compiler built by itself emits byte-identical C.

It was bootstrapped with a Rust compiler (bootstrap/), which is now frozen at the v0.3 language. The test suite still runs it on every program written in that language, and both compilers' verifiers must emit identical SMT for each of them.

Getting started

With Homebrew (macOS or Linux), which also installs Z3:

brew install kranzky/vow/vow

Or with the install script, which downloads a prebuilt vowc for macOS or Linux and checks its checksum:

curl -fsSL https://vow.kranzky.com/install.sh | sh

vowc also needs a C compiler (cc) and Z3 (brew install z3). Vow is tested with Z3 5.3.2: tools/install-z3.sh installs exactly that release, and vowc version shows which Z3 it finds. Linux distribution packages are often much older and may leave hard proofs undecided. Then:

vowc run hello.vow        # verify, compile and run
vowc check hello.vow      # verify only
vowc build hello.vow -o hello

Commands: check, build -o <exe>, run, test, fmt, emit-c, hash, version, help. Options: --json (machine-readable diagnostics), --no-verify, --no-cache, --totality (with check), --check (with fmt).

To build from source instead, you need only a C compiler and Z3:

make                                  # builds build/vowc from seed/vowc.c
build/vowc run examples/bsearch.vow
make test                             # test suite (also needs Rust for the frozen bootstrap compiler)

Editor support

vow-lsp is a language server, installed next to vowc by the release archives and install.sh (from source: make lsp builds build/vow-lsp). As you edit it reports type and effect errors; when you open or save a file, it also reports failed proofs (with counterexamples) and holes (with the facts known there). Hover shows a function's signature and contract, a type's declaration, or the type of a variable, binding or field together with what the verifier knows about it at that line (branch conditions, refinements, invariants, callers' contracts); go to definition finds functions, types, variants and local bindings. Any editor with an LSP client can use it. Neovim (0.11 or later):

vim.filetype.add({ extension = { vow = "vow" } })
vim.lsp.config("vow", { cmd = { "vow-lsp" }, filetypes = { "vow" }, root_markers = { ".git" } })
vim.lsp.enable("vow")

Helix (languages.toml):

[language-server.vow-lsp]
command = "vow-lsp"

[[language]]
name = "vow"
scope = "source.vow"
file-types = ["vow"]
comment-token = "//"
indent = { tab-width = 2, unit = "  " }
language-servers = ["vow-lsp"]

Emacs (Eglot):

(define-derived-mode vow-mode prog-mode "Vow")
(add-to-list 'auto-mode-alist '("\\.vow\\'" . vow-mode))
(with-eval-after-load 'eglot (add-to-list 'eglot-server-programs '(vow-mode "vow-lsp")))

Documents

• docs/SPEC.md: the language specification
• docs/VOW_FOR_LLMS.md: for language models writing Vow
• docs/VOW_FOR_HUMANS.md: what people gain when their LLM colleagues write Vow
• docs/COMPARISON.md: how Vow compares with other languages, and where its ideas come from
• ROADMAP.md: milestones and the V1 scope

Status

The current release is v0.9.0, which adds modules (import "m.vow" as m, private) and packages pinned to git commits (listed here; see the changelog). Vow is an experiment, not yet a V1. Notable gaps: termination is proved only where measures are given; Unix only. See the roadmap.

License

Public domain (Unlicense).