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babashka

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A Clojure babushka for the grey areas of Bash.

Quickstart

$ bash <(curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/borkdude/babashka/master/install)
$ ls | bb --time -i '(filter #(-> % io/file .isDirectory) *in*)'
("doc" "resources" "sci" "script" "src" "target" "test")
bb took 4ms.

Rationale

The sweet spot for babashka is executing Clojure snippets or scripts in the same space where you would use Bash.

As one user described it:

I’m quite at home in Bash most of the time, but there’s a substantial grey area of things that are too complicated to be simple in bash, but too simple to be worth writing a clj/s script for. Babashka really seems to hit the sweet spot for those cases.

Goals:

  • Fast startup / low latency. This is achieved by compiling to native using GraalVM.
  • Familiarity and portability. Keep migration barriers between bash and Clojure as low as possible by:
    • Gradually introducing Clojure expressions to existing bash scripts
    • Scripts written in babashka should also be able to run on the JVM without major changes.
  • Multi-threading support similar to Clojure on the JVM
  • Batteries included (clojure.tools.cli, core.async, ...)

Non-goals:

  • Performance
  • Provide a mixed Clojure/bash DSL (see portability).
  • Replace existing shells. Babashka is a tool you can use inside existing shells like bash and it is designed to play well with them. It does not aim to replace them.

Reasons why babashka may not be the right fit for your use case:

  • It uses sci for interpreting Clojure. Sci implements only a subset of Clojure and is not as performant as compiled code.
  • External libraries are not available (although you may use load-file for loading external scripts).

Read more about the differences with Clojure here.

Status

Experimental. Breaking changes are expected to happen at this phase.

Examples

$ ls | bb -i '*in*'
["LICENSE" "README.md" "bb" "doc" "pom.xml" "project.clj" "reflection.json" "resources" "script" "src" "target" "test"]

$ ls | bb -i '(count *in*)'
12

$ bb '(vec (dedupe *in*))' <<< '[1 1 1 1 2]'
[1 2]

$ bb '(filterv :foo *in*)' <<< '[{:foo 1} {:bar 2}]'
[{:foo 1}]

$ bb '(#(+ %1 %2 %3) 1 2 *in*)' <<< 3
6

$ ls | bb -i '(filterv #(re-find #"reflection" %) *in*)'
["reflection.json"]

$ bb '(run! #(shell/sh "touch" (str "/tmp/test/" %)) (range 100))'
$ ls /tmp/test | bb -i '*in*'
["0" "1" "10" "11" "12" "13" "14" "15" "16" "17" "18" "19" "2" "20" "21" ...]

$ bb -O '(repeat "dude")' | bb --stream '(str *in* "rino")' | bb -I '(take 3 *in*)'
("duderino" "duderino" "duderino")

More examples can be found in the gallery.

Installation

Brew

Linux and macOS binaries are provided via brew.

Install:

brew install borkdude/brew/babashka

Upgrade:

brew upgrade babashka

Arch (Linux)

babashka is available in the Arch User Repository. It can be installed using your favorite AUR helper such as yay, yaourt, apacman and pacaur. Here is an example using yay:

yay -S babashka-bin

Installer script

Install via the installer script:

$ bash <(curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/borkdude/babashka/master/install)

By default this will install into /usr/local/bin. To change this, provide the directory name:

$ bash <(curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/borkdude/babashka/master/install) /tmp

Download

You may also download a binary from Github.

Usage

Usage: bb [ -i | -I ] [ -o | -O ] [ --stream ] ( -e <expression> | -f <file> | --socket-repl [<host>:]<port> )

Options:

  --help, -h or -?: print this help text.
  --version: print the current version of babashka.

  -i: bind *in* to a lazy seq of lines from stdin.
  -I: bind *in* to a lazy seq of EDN values from stdin.
  -o: write lines to stdout.
  -O: write EDN values to stdout.
  --stream: stream over lines or EDN values from stdin. Combined with -i or -I *in* becomes a single value per iteration.
  -e, --eval <expression>: evaluate an expression
  -f, --file <path>: evaluate a file
  --socket-repl: start socket REPL. Specify port (e.g. 1666) or host and port separated by colon (e.g. 127.0.0.1:1666).
  --time: print execution time before exiting.

If neither -e, -f, or --socket-repl are specified, then the first argument that is not parsed as a option is treated as a file if it exists, or as an expression otherwise.
Everything after that is bound to *command-line-args*.

The clojure.core functions are accessible without a namespace alias.

The following namespaces are required by default and available through the pre-defined aliases. You may use require + :as and/or :refer on these namespaces. If not all vars are available, they are enumerated explicitly.

  • clojure.string aliased as str
  • clojure.set aliased as set
  • clojure.edn aliased as edn:
    • read-string
  • clojure.java.shell aliases as shell:
    • sh
  • clojure.java.io aliased as io:
    • as-relative-path, copy, delete-file, file
  • clojure.core.async aliased as async. The alt and go macros are not available but alts!! does work as it is a function.
  • me.raynes.conch.low-level aliased as conch
  • clojure.tools.cli aliased as tools.cli
  • clojure.data.csv aliased as csv

The following Java classes are available:

  • ArithmeticException
  • AssertionError
  • Boolean
  • Class
  • Double
  • Exception
  • clojure.lang.ExceptionInfo
  • Integer
  • java.io.File
  • java.nio.Files
  • java.util.regex.Pattern
  • String
  • System
  • Thread

More classes can be added by request. See reflection.json and the :classes option in main.clj.

Babashka supports import : (import clojure.lang.ExceptionInfo).

Babashka supports a subset of the ns form where you may use :require and :import:

(ns foo
  (:require [clojure.string :as str])
  (:import clojure.lang.ExceptionInfo))

For the unsupported parts of the ns form, you may use reader conditionals to maintain compatibility with JVM Clojure.

Special vars:

  • *in*: contains the input read from stdin. EDN by default, multiple lines of text with the -i option, or multiple EDN values with the -I option.
  • *command-line-args*: contain the command line args

Additionally, babashka adds the following functions:

  • wait/wait-for-port. Usage:
(wait/wait-for-port "localhost" 8080)
(wait/wait-for-port "localhost" 8080 {:timeout 1000 :pause 1000})

Waits for TCP connection to be available on host and port. Options map supports :timeout and :pause. If :timeout is provided and reached, :default's value (if any) is returned. The :pause option determines the time waited between retries.

  • wait/wait-for-path. Usage:
(wait/wait-for-path "/tmp/wait-path-test")
(wait/wait-for-path "/tmp/wait-path-test" {:timeout 1000 :pause 1000})

Waits for file path to be available. Options map supports :default, :timeout and :pause. If :timeout is provided and reached, :default's value (if any) is returned. The :pause option determines the time waited between retries.

  • sig/pipe-signal-received?. Usage:
(sig/pipe-signal-received?)

Returns true if PIPE signal was received. Example:

$ bb '((fn [x] (println x) (when (not (sig/pipe-signal-received?)) (recur (inc x)))) 0)' | head -n2
1
2

Running a file

Scripts may be executed from a file using -f or --file:

bb -f download_html.clj

Files can also be loaded inline using load-file:

bb '(load-file "script.clj")'

Using bb with a shebang also works:

#!/usr/bin/env bb

(defn get-url [url]
  (println "Fetching url:" url)
  (let [{:keys [:exit :err :out]} (shell/sh "curl" "-sS" url)]
    (if (zero? exit) out
      (do (println "ERROR:" err)
          (System/exit 1)))))

(defn write-html [file html]
  (println "Writing file:" file)
  (spit file html))

(let [[url file] *command-line-args*]
  (when (or (empty? url) (empty? file))
    (println "Usage: <url> <file>")
    (System/exit 1))
  (write-html file (get-url url)))

(System/exit 0)

$ ./download_html.clj
Usage: <url> <file>

$ ./download_html.clj https://www.clojure.org /tmp/clojure.org.html
Fetching url: https://www.clojure.org
Writing file: /tmp/clojure.org.html

If /usr/bin/env doesn't work for you, you can use the following workaround:

$ cat script.clj
#!/bin/sh

#_(
   "exec" "bb" "$0" hello "$@"
   )

(prn *command-line-args*)

./script.clj 1 2 3
("hello" "1" "2" "3")

Parsing command line arguments

Babashka ships with clojure.tools.cli:

(require '[clojure.tools.cli :refer [parse-opts]])

(def cli-options
  ;; An option with a required argument
  [["-p" "--port PORT" "Port number"
    :default 80
    :parse-fn #(Integer/parseInt %)
    :validate [#(< 0 % 0x10000) "Must be a number between 0 and 65536"]]
   ["-h" "--help"]])

(:options (parse-opts *command-line-args* cli-options))

$ bb script.clj
{:port 80}
$ bb script.clj -h
{:port 80, :help true}

Reader conditionals

Babashka supports reader conditionals using the :bb feature:

$ cat example.clj
#?(:clj (in-ns 'foo) :bb (println "babashka doesn't support in-ns yet!"))

$ ./bb example.clj
babashka doesn't support in-ns yet!

Preloads

The environment variable BABASHKA_PRELOADS allows to define code that will be available in all subsequent usages of babashka.

BABASHKA_PRELOADS='(defn foo [x] (+ x 2))'
BABASHKA_PRELOADS=$BABASHKA_PRELOADS' (defn bar [x] (* x 2))'
export BABASHKA_PRELOADS

Note that you can concatenate multiple expressions. Now you can use these functions in babashka:

$ bb '(-> (foo *in*) bar)' <<< 1
6

You can also preload an entire file using load-file:

export BABASHKA_PRELOADS='(load-file "my_awesome_prelude.clj")'

Note that *in* is not available in preloads.

Socket REPL

Start the socket REPL like this:

$ bb --socket-repl 1666
Babashka socket REPL started at localhost:1666

Now you can connect with your favorite socket REPL client:

$ rlwrap nc 127.0.0.1 1666
Babashka v0.0.14 REPL.
Use :repl/quit or :repl/exit to quit the REPL.
Clojure rocks, Bash reaches.

bb=> (+ 1 2 3)
6
bb=> :repl/quit
$

A socket REPL client for Emacs is inf-clojure.

Spawning and killing a process

You may use the conch namespace for this. It maps to me.raynes.conch.low-level.

Example:

$ bb '
(def ws (conch/proc "python" "-m" "SimpleHTTPServer" "1777"))
(net/wait-for-it "localhost" 1777) (conch/destroy ws)'

Async

Apart from future for creating threads and the conch namespace for creating processes, you may use the async namespace, which maps to clojure.core.async, for asynchronous scripting. The following example shows how to get first available value from two different processes:

bb '
(defn async-command [& args]
  (async/thread (apply shell/sh "bash" "-c" args)))

(-> (async/alts!! [(async-command "sleep 2 && echo process 1")
                   (async-command "sleep 1 && echo process 2")])
    first :out str/trim println)'
process 2

Differences with Clojure

Babashka is implemented using the Small Clojure Interpreter. This means that a snippet or script is not compiled to JVM bytecode, but executed form by form by a runtime which implements a subset of Clojure. Babashka is compiled to a native binary using GraalVM. It comes with a selection of built-in namespaces and functions from Clojure and other useful libraries. The data types (numbers, strings, persistent collections) are the same. Multi-threading is supported (pmap, future).

Differences with Clojure:

  • No first class vars. Note that you can define and redefine global values with def / defn, but there is no var indirection.

  • A subset of Java classes are supported.

  • Only the clojure.core, clojure.set and clojure.string namespaces are available from Clojure.

  • There is no classpath and no support for loading code from Maven/Clojars dependencies. However, you can use load-file to load external code from disk.

  • require does not load files; it only provides a way to create different aliases for included namespaces, which makes it easier to make scripts portable between the JVM and babashka.

  • Interpretation comes with overhead. Therefore tight loops are likely slower than in Clojure on the JVM.

  • No support for unboxed types.

Developing Babashka

To work on Babashka itself make sure Git submodules are checked out.

$ git clone https://github.com/borkdude/babashka --recursive

To update later on:

$ git submodule update --recursive

You need Leiningen, and for building binaries you need GraalVM.

REPL

lein repl will get you a standard REPL/nREPL connection. To work on tests use lein with-profiles +test repl.

Test

Test on the JVM (for development):

script/test

Test the native version:

BABASHKA_TEST_ENV=native script/test

Build

To build this project, set $GRAALVM_HOME to the GraalVM distribution directory.

Then run:

script/compile

Related projects

Gallery

Here's a gallery of more useful examples. Do you have a useful example? PR welcome!

Delete a list of files returned by a Unix command

find . | grep conflict | bb -i '(doseq [f *in*] (.delete (io/file f)))'

Shuffle the lines of a file

$ cat /tmp/test.txt
1 Hello
2 Clojure
3 Babashka
4 Goodbye

$ < /tmp/test.txt bb -io '(shuffle *in*)'
3 Babashka
2 Clojure
4 Goodbye
1 Hello

Fetch latest Github release tag

For converting JSON to EDN, see jet.

$ curl -s https://api.github.com/repos/borkdude/babashka/tags |
jet --from json --keywordize --to edn |
bb '(-> *in* first :name (subs 1))'
"0.0.4"

Get latest OS-specific download url from Github

$ curl -s https://api.github.com/repos/borkdude/babashka/releases |
jet --from json --keywordize |
bb '(-> *in* first :assets)' |
bb '(some #(re-find #".*linux.*" (:browser_download_url %)) *in*)'
"https://github.com/borkdude/babashka/releases/download/v0.0.4/babashka-0.0.4-linux-amd64.zip"

View download statistics from Clojars

$ curl https://clojars.org/stats/all.edn |
bb -o '(for [[[group art] counts] *in*] (str (reduce + (vals counts))  " " group "/" art))' |
sort -rn |
less
14113842 clojure-complete/clojure-complete
9065525 clj-time/clj-time
8504122 cheshire/cheshire
...

Portable tree command

$ clojure -Sdeps '{:deps {org.clojure/tools.cli {:mvn/version "0.4.2"}}}' examples/tree.clj src
src
└── babashka
    ├── impl
    │   ├── tools
    │   │   └── cli.clj
...

$ examples/tree.clj src
src
└── babashka
    ├── impl
    │   ├── tools
    │   │   └── cli.clj

Thanks

License

Copyright © 2019 Michiel Borkent

Distributed under the EPL License. See LICENSE.

This project contains code from:

  • Clojure, which is licensed under the same EPL License.
  • conch, which is licensed under the same EPL License.

Can you improve this documentation? These fine people already did:
Michiel Borkent, Arne Brasseur, David Harrigan, sogaiu & Peter StrömbergEdit on GitHub

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