protist

Protist (alpha software)

Computation of values using a chain of logic and math.

Protist is a simple, yet flexible engine to transform values using a chain of functions.

In some ways it behaves similar to Functional Programming (FP). It does;

• Avoid shared state
• Avoid mutating state
• Avoid side effects

Protist requires you to solve problems using existing building blocks. As it;

• Only supports pure functions
• And it doesn't allow loops (no for or while)

Chains

A chain is a series of functions where the output from one or serveral functions acts as input to another function, or multiple functions. Each function is executed in order and this order is important.

NOTE: Protist doesn't currently support input in the following format. This is just an example.

1: const 10   // constant value 10
2: const 20   // constant value 20
3: add $1 $2  // add (+) line 1 and line 2 -> 30
4: sub $1 $3  // subtract (-) line 3 from line 1 -> -20
5: add $1 $2  // again, add (+) line 1 and line 2 -> 30

The result is always tracked by the instance of the function. It is therefore impossible to overwrite a result of a function.

Backend

While Protist currently doesn't have a well defined backend for chain declaration. It does support a very basic JSON structure and also provides a way for backend plug-ins to be developed.

GUI

Plans for a GUI exists and it will probably look something similar to this mock-up.