Murex is a typed shell.
Unlike other typed shells, Murex can still work natively with existing CLI tools without any tweaks.
Murex's unique approach to type annotations means you have the safety and convenience of working with data formats besides just byte streams and string variables, while still having compatibility with every tool written for Linux and UNIX over the last 50 years.
Murex doesn't just aim to be a well thought out language, the interactive shell boasts an excellent out-of-the-box experience which makes other shells feel stone age in comparison.
If you want to learn more about the interactive shell then there is a dedicated document detailing Murex's REPL features.
Shells need to balance scripting with an efficient interactive terminal interface. One of the most common approaches to solving that conflict between readability and terseness is to make heavy use of barewords. Barewords are ostensibly just instructions that are not quoted. In our case, command names and command parameters.
Murex also makes heavy use of barewords and so that places restrictions on the choice of syntax we can use.
An expression is an evaluation, operation or assignment, for example:
» 6 > 5
» fruit = %[ apples oranges bananas ]
» 5 + 5
Expressions are type sensitive
Whereas a statement is a shell command to execute:
» echo "Hello Murex"
» kill 1234
All values in a statement are treated as strings
Due to the expectation of shell commands supporting bareword parameters, expressions have to be parsed differently to statements. Thus Murex first parses a command line to see if it is a valid expression, and if it is not, it then assumes it is an statement and parses it as such.
This allow expressions and statements to be used interchangeably in a pipeline:
» 5 + 5 | grep 10
A function is command that doesn't take data from stdin whereas a method is any command that does.
echo "Hello Murex" | grep "Murex"
^ a function ^ a method
In practical terms, functions and methods are executed in exactly the same way however some builtins might behave differently depending on whether values are passed via stdin or as parameters. Thus you will often find references to functions and methods, and sometimes for the same command, within these documents.
Some Murex builtins support a bang prefix. This prefix alters the behavior of those builtins to perform the conceptual opposite of their primary role.
For example, you could grep a file with regexp 'm/(dogs|cats)/' but then you
might want to exclude any matches by using !regexp 'm/(dogs|cats)/' instead.
The details for each supported bang prefix will be in the documents for their respective builtin.
If you already know Bash and looking for the equivalent syntax in Murex, then our Rosetta Stone reference will help you to translate your Bash code into Murex code.
A table for all operators and tokens can be found on the operators and tokens cheatsheet. However if you are new to the shell, we recommend that you read this document first.
It is important to note that all strings in expressions are quoted whereas strings in statements can be barewords.
There are three ways to quote a string in Murex:
'single quote': use this for string literals (read more)"double quote": use this for infixing variables (read more)%(brace quote): use this for nesting quotes (read more)
You can comment out a single like, or end of a line with #:
# this is a comment
echo Hello Murex # this is also a comment
Multiple lines or mid-line comments can be achieved with /# and #/ tokens:
/#
This is
a multi-line
command
#/
...which can also be inlined...
» echo Hello /# comment #/ Murex
(/# was chosen because it is similar to C-style comments however /* is a
valid glob so Murex has substituted the asterisks with a hash symbol instead)
All variables can be defined as expressions and their data types are inferred:
name = "bob"age = 20 * 2fruit = %[ apples oranges bananas ]
If any variables are unset then reading from them will produce an error (under Murex's default behavior):
» echo $foobar
Error in `echo` (1,1): variable 'foobar' does not exist
Global variables can be defined using the $GLOBAL namespace:
» $GLOBAL.foo = "bar"
You can also force Murex to read the global assignment of $foo (ignoring
any local assignments, should they exist) using the same syntax. eg:
» $GLOBAL.name = "Tom"
» out $name
Tom
» $name = "Sally"
» out $GLOBAL.name
Tom
» out $name
Sally
Environmental Variables are like global variables except they are copied to any other programs that are launched from your shell session.
Environmental variables can be assigned using the $ENV namespace:
» $ENV.foo = "bar"
as well as using the export statement like with traditional shells. (read more)
Like with global variables, you can force Murex to read the environmental
variable, bypassing and local or global variables of the same name, by also
using the $ENV namespace prefix.
In general, Murex will try to infer the data type of a variable or pipe. It
can do this by checking the Content-Type HTTP header, the file name
extension or just looking at how that data was constructed (when defined via
expressions). However sometimes you may need to annotate your types. (read more)
In traditional shells, variables are expanded in a way that results in spaces be parsed as different command parameters. This results in numerous problems where developers need to remember to enclose variables inside quotes.
Murex parses variables as tokens and expands them into the command line arguments intuitively. So, there are no more accidental bugs due to spaces in file names, or other such problems due to developers forgetting to quote variables. For example:
» file = "file name.txt"
» touch $file # this would normally need to be quoted
» ls
'file name.txt'
Due to variables not being expanded into arrays by default, Murex supports an
additional variable construct for arrays. These are @ prefixed:
» files = %[file1.txt, file2.txt, file3.txt]
» touch @files
» ls
file1.txt file2.txt file3.txt
Murex supports multiple different pipe tokens. The main two being | and
->.
-
|works exactly the same as in any normal shell. (read more) -
->displays all of the supported methods (commands that support the output of the previous command). Think of it a little like object orientated programming where an object will have functions (methods) attached. (read more)
In Murex scripts you can use | and -> interchangeably, so there's no need
to remember which commands are methods and which are not. The difference only
applies in the interactive shell where -> can be used with tab-autocompletion
to display a shortlist of supported functions that can manipulate the data from
the previous command. It's purely a clue to the parser to generate different
autocompletion suggestions to help with your discovery of different command
line tools.
Redirection of stdout and stderr is very different in Murex. There is no
support for the 2> or &1 tokens, instead you name the pipe inside angle
brackets, in the first parameter(s).
out is that processes stdout (fd1), err is that processes stderr (fd2), and
null is the equivalent of piping to /dev/null.
Any pipes prefixed by a bang means reading from that processes stderr.
So to redirect stderr to stdout you would use <!out>:
err <!out> "error message redirected to stdout"
And to redirect stdout to stderr you would use <err>:
out <err> "output redirected to stderr"
Likewise you can redirect either stdout, or stderr to /dev/null via <null>
or <!null> respectively.
command <!null> # ignore stderr
command <null> # ignore stdout
You can also create your own pipes that are files, network connections, or any other custom data input or output endpoint. (read more)
out "message" |> truncate-file.txt
out "message" >> append-file.txt
Aside from annotating variables upon definition, you can also transform data
along the pipeline using format.
Casting doesn't alter the data, it simply changes the meta-information about how that data should be read.
out [1,2,3] | cast json | foreach { ... }
There is also a little syntactic sugar to do the same:
out [1,2,3] | :json: foreach { ... }
format takes the source data and reformats it into another data format:
» out [1,2,3] | :json: format yaml
- 1
- 2
- 3
There are two main types of emendable sub-shells: strings and arrays.
-
string sub-shells,
${ command }, take the results from the sub-shell and return it as a single parameter. This saves the need to encapsulate the shell inside quotation marks. -
array sub-shells,
@{ command }, take the results from the sub-shell and expand it as parameters.
Examples:
touch ${ %[1,2,3] } # creates a file named '[1,2,3]'
touch @{ %[1,2,3] } # creates three files, named '1', '2' and '3'
The reason Murex breaks from the traditions of using backticks and parentheses is because Murex works on the principle that everything inside a curly bracket is considered a new block of code.
While glob expansion is supported in the interactive shell, there isn't auto-expansion of globbing in shell scripts. This is to protect against accidental damage. Instead globbing is achieved via sub-shells using either:
g- traditional globbing (read more)rx- regexp matching in current directory only (read more)f- file type matching (read more)
Examples:
All text files via globbing:
g *.txt
All text and markdown files via regexp:
rx '\.(txt|md)$'
All directories via type matching:
f +d
You can also chain them together, eg all directories named *.txt:
g *.txt | f +d
To use them in a shell script it could look something a like this:
rm @{g *.txt | f +s}
(this deletes any symlinks called *.txt)
In bash you can expand lists
using the following syntax: a{1..5}b. In Murex, like with globbing, brace
expansion is a function: a a[1..5]b and supports a much wider range of lists
that can be expanded. (read more)
You can create "aliases" to common commands to save you a few keystrokes. For example:
alias gc=git commit
alias behaves slightly differently to Bash. (read more)
You can create custom functions in Murex using function. (read more)
function gc (message: str) {
# shorthand for `git commit`
git commit -m $message
}
private functions are like public functions except they
are only available within their own modules namespace. (read more)
External executables (including any programs located in $PATH) are invoked
via the exec builtin (read more) however if a command
isn't an expression, alias, function nor builtin, then Murex assumes it is an
external executable and automatically invokes exec.
For example the two following statements are the same:
exec unameuname
Thus for normal day to day usage, you shouldn't need to include exec.
if can be used in a number of different ways, the most common being:
if { true } then {
# do something
} else {
# do something else
}
if supports a flexible variety of incarnation to solve different problems. (read more)
Because if ... else if chains are ugly, Murex supports switch statements:
switch $USER {
case "Tom" { out "Hello Tom" }
case "Dick" { out "Howdie Richard" }
case "Sally" { out "Nice to meet you" }
default {
out "I don't know who you are"
}
}
switch supports a flexible variety of different usages to solve different
problems. (read more)
foreach allows you to easily iterate through an array or list of any type: (read more)
%[ apples bananas oranges ] | foreach fruit { out "I like $fruit" }
formap loops are the equivalent of foreach but against map objects: (read more)
%{
Bob: {age: 10},
Richard: {age: 20},
Sally: {age: 30}
} | formap name person {
out "$name is $person[age] years old"
}
continue will terminate execution of an inner block in iteration loops like
foreach and formap. Thus continuing the loop from the next iteration:
%[1..10] | foreach i {
if { $i == 5 } then {
continue foreach
# ^ jump back to the next iteration
}
out $i
}
continue requires a parameter to define while block to iterate on. This means
you can use continue within nested loops and still have readable code. (read more)
break will terminate execution of a block (eg function, private, if,
foreach, etc):
%[1..10] | foreach i {
if { $i == 5 } then {
break foreach
# ^ exit foreach
}
out $i
}
break requires a parameter to define while block to end. Thus break can be
considered to exhibit the behavior of return as well as break in other
languages:
function example {
if { $USER == "root" } then {
err "Don't run this as root"
break example
}
# ... do something ...
}
break cannot exit anything above it's callers scope. (read more)
return ends the current scope (typically a function). (read more)
exit terminates Murex. It is not scope aware; if it is included in a function
then the whole shell will still exist and not just that function. (read more)
This can be invoked by pressing Ctrl + c.
This is functionally the same as fid-kill. ((read more))
This can be invoked by pressing Ctrl + \. (read more)
Sending SIGQUIT will terminate all running functions in the current Murex session. Which is a handy escape hatch if your shell code starts misbehaving.
This can be invoked by pressing Ctrl + z. (read more)
- Install: Installation Instructions
- Operators And Tokens: All supported operators and tokens
This document was generated from gen/root/tour_doc.yaml.