The kardashev Documentation

kardashev is a Rust-flavored systems programming language whose signature feature is lightweight effect labels in the type system: every function declares which side effects it can produce (io, alloc, panic, async, unwind) as part of its signature, and the compiler tracks them across call chains — pure type-system information, with zero runtime cost. It compiles to native code through LLVM (an ORC JIT for the REPL and an AOT path for executables), with Rust-style ownership + non-lexical-lifetime borrow checking.

This site is the reference documentation. It is built from the Markdown in the docs/ directory with mdBook and lives next to the compiler, so each language change updates its docs in the same pull request.

Contents

• Language Reference — the surface syntax and semantics: types, generics, traits + impl, ADTs + pattern matching, ownership, Result + ?, and the effect-row notation.
• Effects System — the signature feature in depth: effect labels, effect-row polymorphism, and how effects propagate across calls.
• Standard Library — the built-in prelude: Option / Result, Vec / String / HashMap / HashSet / Box, the trait + #[derive] machinery, combinators, and string utilities.
• Compiler Architecture — the pipeline from lexer through type/borrow/effect checking to LLVM codegen, monomorphization, and the JIT/AOT backends.

For the project roadmap, build instructions, and source, see the repository README.