Language design

Design direction

Wave aims to keep systems-level control visible in source code. That direction appears in several concrete facilities:

• Types are explicit at function and data boundaries, including local variable declarations.
• ptr<T>, &, and deref make addresses and memory accesses explicit.
• C ABI boundaries are declared with extern(c) and export(c).
• wavec exposes target, CPU-feature, linker, and freestanding-build controls.
• Functions, structs, enums, generics, and proto provide higher-level program structure.

Language versus standard library

Language syntax and the standard library are separate layers. For example, print, println, and input are language statements, while string searching, file systems, networking, and memory helpers are standard-library modules.

Keeping that distinction clear makes it easier to tell whether a feature belongs to the language grammar, library API, or toolchain.

Local variables

var fixed: i32 = 10;
var state: i32 = 0;
var counter: i32 = 0;

var is the syntax for declaring a local variable.

Explicit contracts

Wave documentation presents each language feature through its syntax and observable behavior. Low-level operations also state the memory, ABI, target, or ownership rules that a program must uphold. This keeps source code understandable without relying on compiler internals.