Introduction

Ao is a statically typed language powered by WebAssembly.

Features

• Statically Typed: Ao is a statically typed language. In the future, it will include a type inference system.
• WebAssembly: Ao emits Wasm components, not native binaries. For more information, see the Component Model design and specification.
  • Write Once, Run Anywhere: Ao can run on any platform that supports WebAssembly. Write your code once and run it in the browser, on a server, or even on IoT devices.
• Rust-Like Syntax: Ao features a syntax similar to Rust. If you’re familiar with Rust, learning Ao will be straightforward. You can think of Ao as Rust with garbage collection, or Go with Rust’s syntax.
• Garbage Collection: Ao has a garbage collector, so you don’t need to manually manage memory. For more information, see the GC Proposal for WebAssembly.

Getting Started

To get started with Ao, try the online playground. You can write code in the left editor and see the output, ast, and tokens in the right panel.

Note

The playground is working without a backend server. The given code is compiled and executed entirely in the browser!

For example, try writing the following code in the editor:

fn main() -> i32 {
    let a = 10;
    let b = 20;
    print_int(a + b);
    0
}

You should see the output 30 in the right panel.