Input & Output

Ooga Booga programs communicate with the user through two built-in statements: SAY (output) and HEAR (input).

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SAY — print output

SAY evaluates an expression and prints it to standard output, followed by a newline.

SAY "Hello, cave!"
SAY 42
SAY 3.14
SAY YEAH

Output:

Hello, cave!
42
3.14
true

SAY accepts any expression, including function calls and arithmetic:

OOGA x: ROCK BE 7
SAY x TIMES x                            OOF 49
SAY "x squared: " PLUS WORDY(x TIMES x)

The compiler emits println!("{}", expr); for every SAY.

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HEAR — read input

HEAR reads one line from standard input and stores it in a WORDS variable. The variable must be declared with OOGA before HEAR can assign to it.

OOGA name: WORDS
SAY "What is your name?"
HEAR name
SAY "Hello, " PLUS name PLUS "!"

HEAR always produces WORDS

HEAR always stores a WORDS (String) value. To treat input as a number, convert it with a built-in:

OOGA raw: WORDS
HEAR raw
OOGA n: ROCK BE NUMBR(raw)
SAY n TIMES 2

Generated Rust for HEAR name:

{
    let mut __ooga_input = String::new();
    std::io::stdin().read_line(&mut __ooga_input).expect("UGH! CAVE EAR BROKEN");
    name = __ooga_input.trim().to_string();
}

No external dependencies are needed — HEAR uses Rust's standard library.

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Full interactive example

OOF Number guessing game

OOGA secret: ROCK BE 7
OOGA guess: ROCK BE 0
OOGA raw: WORDS
OOGA won: GRUNT BE NAH

UGGA WHILE NOT won
    SAY "Guess a number between 1 and 10:"
    HEAR raw
    guess GETS NUMBR(raw)
    IFF guess IS secret
        SAY "YES! CAVE BRAIN CORRECT! UGH UGH!"
        won GETS YEAH
    NOPE IFF guess SMALLR secret
        SAY "Too small! Think bigger, cave creature."
    NOPE
        SAY "Too big! Think smaller, cave creature."
    UGHA
UGHA