0.2.0

Released 2026-03-07. GitHub release | Downloads

Added

• BoxLang-Authored Prelude: Standard BIFs (e.g., arrayMap, structEach, arrayFilter, isEmpty) are now implemented in BoxLang, reducing core VM size.
• Tree-Shaking Compiler: Automated dependency analysis to exclude unused prelude functions from standalone binaries.
• Cross-Compilation Support: Embedded runner stubs for Linux, macOS, and Windows into "fat" CLI binaries via the cross-compile Cargo feature.
• Multi-Stage CI: Refactored GitHub Actions to natively build stubs on each OS and aggregate them into single distribution binaries.
• Namespaced Function Attributes: Support for @matchbox-keep to explicitly preserve symbols from tree-shaking.
• New CLI Flags:
  • --keep <symbols>: Manually preserve BIFs in the final binary.
  • --no-shaking: Disable tree-shaking to include the full prelude.
  • --no-std-lib: Completely exclude the standard library.
• Java Interop: Implemented dynamic JNI reflection bridge for automatic Java method discovery and invocation.
• Asynchronous Execution: Implemented runAsync BIF and VM-level fiber spawning.
• Documentation: Added comprehensive documentation structure in /docs.

Changed

• Migrated multiple BIFs (Math, Array, Struct) from Rust implementations to the BoxLang prelude.
• Refactored build.rs to support pre-existing stub injection and multi-target compilation.
• Unified bytecode serialization to u32 for better cross-platform compatibility.

Fixed

• Fixed specialized integer math opcodes (OpAddInt, OpSubInt, OpMulInt) to correctly handle float-backed constants.
• Resolved grammar conflict between classic for-loop initialization and optional semicolons.
• Fixed case-insensitivity in member method resolution (e.g., .toUpperCase() correctly maps to ucase).