Tools

#Installation

Burn is installed and managed by burnup, a version manager written in Burn:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/burnlang/burnup/master/install.sh | sh

This installs burnup, the newest Burn and ash into ~/.burn and adds ~/.burn/bin to your PATH in ~/.profile, ~/.bashrc, ~/.zshrc (whichever exist) and fish. Open a new terminal (or run . ~/.burn/env) and check it:

burn version
burni -e 'print("hello")'

See the toolchain for what each command does.

#Requirements

• Linux or macOS (Windows: see manual installation)
• git, which burnup and ash use to download Burn versions and packages
• A C compiler (cc), tar and xz for versions built from source (branches such as master, and any version without a prebuilt release): the C compiler assembles the seed that comes with the sources, which builds the rest. Nothing else is needed, no Burn and no Rust.
• A C toolchain (cc) to build native executables with burnc. Everything else works without it.

#Versions

burnup install 26.1          # a release: the newest 26.1.x
burnup install master        # the newest commit, built from source
burnup default 26.1          # the version used everywhere
burnup list                  # installed versions
burnup list --remote         # versions that can be installed
burnup update                # rebuild branch versions that moved, and update ash
burnup uninstall master

A version is a release (26.1, v26.1.0, ^26.1), latest, a branch or a commit. Each one lives in its own folder in ~/.burn/toolchains, and the commands in ~/.burn/bin are small shims that run the active one.

#A version per project

A project asks for a Burn version in its burn.toml:

[package]
name = "github.com/you/app"
burn = "26.1"

A .burn-version file does the same for any folder, and burnup pin 26.1 writes whichever fits. Inside the folder every Burn command runs that version; burnup installs it the first time it is needed. The order is BURN_TOOLCHAIN, then the nearest burn.toml with burn or .burn-version, then the default.

burnup show                  # which version runs here, and why
burnup which burnc           # the file that runs
burnup run master burn check # one command with another version

#Updating and uninstalling

burnup update                # branch versions and ash
burnup self update           # burnup itself
burnup self uninstall        # everything: versions, packages, commands and the PATH lines

#Installer options

Pass them with sh -s --:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/burnlang/burnup/master/install.sh | sh -s -- --prefix /opt/burn --no-modify-path

The old address, burnlang/burn/master/install.sh, still works and runs burnup.

#Working on Burn itself

scripts/package.sh builds a checkout into the same layout as a release. Add the result to burnup as a version:

sh scripts/package.sh --prefix ~/burn-dev
burnup link dev ~/burn-dev
burnup run dev burn version

#Prebuilt releases

Tagged versions (v*) are built by the release workflow for linux-x86_64, macos-x86_64 and macos-aarch64, and burnup downloads them. To unpack one by hand:

tar -xzf burn-linux-x86_64.tar.gz
./burn/bin/burn version

#Manual installation

Linux and macOS, on x86-64 and arm64, can build the toolchain from a checkout with a C compiler, tar and xz:

sh scripts/package.sh --prefix ~/.burn

This assembles the seed in compiler/boot (the compiler written in Burn, as assembly for this platform), lets it build the compiler from compiler/src until the compiler reproduces itself (how the compiler builds itself), builds bin/burn and the runtime libraries with it, and lays out bin/ (burni, burnc, burn-lsp and bvm are links to burn, burnfmt is a script) and share/burn/. It takes under a minute.