Install Niell

Niell is in pre-release. For Linux x86_64 there's a precompiled binary you can download (below). For macOS and other architectures, you build from source with Rust + LLVM.

Linux x86_64 — direct download (recommended)

Works on any distro with glibc 2.34+: Ubuntu 22.04+, Debian 12+, RHEL 9+, Fedora 38+, Arch, openSUSE Leap 15.5+. Also requires clang installed (Niell invokes clang to link the C runtime with the emitted IR).

# 1. Install clang + xz (if not already there)
sudo apt install -y clang xz-utils    # Ubuntu / Debian
# sudo dnf install -y clang xz        # Fedora / RHEL
# sudo pacman -S clang xz             # Arch

# 2. Download + decompress + put it on PATH
curl -L https://niell.dev/dl/niell-linux-x86_64.xz | xz -d > niell
chmod +x niell
sudo mv niell /usr/local/bin/

# 3. Verify
niell --help

The binary is self-contained with respect to LLVM 18 and the Niell runtime — it doesn't require installing the Rust toolchain or LLVM dev libs. It ships compressed with xz (~12 MB downloaded; ~48 MB after decompression).

macOS — not yet supported

Pre-release Niell doesn't have a macOS binary or a publicly distributable source build yet. It's a later-Slice exercise once demand appears.

If you want to try it on Mac:

• Prerequisites for the future "build from source" path: Rust toolchain + LLVM 18 via Homebrew (brew install llvm@18). For clang, it ships with the Xcode Command Line Tools.
• Or wait for the release with native binary (cross-compile to x86_64-apple-darwin and aarch64-apple-darwin is on the roadmap).

Windows — via WSL2

Niell doesn't support native Windows yet — the linker has trouble with LLVM static libs in the MSVC toolchain. Roadmap candidate but deferred for now.

Recommended: WSL2 with Ubuntu 22.04+ and then follow the Linux x86_64 instructions above.

# PowerShell with admin permissions:
wsl --install -d Ubuntu-24.04

Restart, open "Ubuntu 24.04" from the start menu, choose user + password. Then follow the steps in "Linux x86_64 — direct download".

Keep your .niell files inside the WSL filesystem (~/...) to avoid friction with the cross-filesystem split.

Test the compiler

Create hello.niell:

action main
  show with "hello, niell"
end

Compile and run:

niell hello.niell -o hello
./hello
# → hello, niell

Next steps

Once you have niell working, check Getting started for a 10-minute tour, or jump straight to the spec at 01 Syntax (ES).