Getting started

This page gets you from “a file” to “a runnable program”, and points you at the docs you’ll use most often.

If you already have a silk binary on your PATH, start with “Write a program”.

If you don’t, see “Build from source” for the reference compiler workflow.

Write a program#

Create hello.slk:

import { println } from "std/io";

fn main () -> int {
  println("hello from silk");
  return 0;
}

Run the normal loop:

silk check hello.slk
silk test hello.slk
silk build hello.slk -o build/hello
./build/hello

If you prefer a step-by-step walkthrough, start here:

• Tutorial 1: your first program

Packages (silk.toml)#

For larger projects, describe the module set in silk.toml and use --package:

silk check --package .
silk test  --package .
silk build --package .
silk package inspect --package .
silk package lint --package .

Use inspect to confirm the package name, version, definitions, dependencies, and declared artifacts. Use lint before installation or publication to catch missing definition files, bad artifact paths, or incomplete [dist] coverage.

Reference:

• Package manifests
• Package distribution
• silk-package (1)
• CLI examples

Build from source (reference compiler)#

The reference Silk compiler/toolchain is built with Zig.

From the Silk compiler repository root:

make build

This builds missing hosted dependencies on supported native hosts and stages a repo-local toolchain. Among its outputs are:

• build/bin/silk (the CLI)
• build/bin/silk-lsp (the language server)
• build/lib/libsilk.a (the C ABI library)
• build/lib/silk/std/libsilk_std.a (the prebuilt stdlib archive on supported native hosts)
• build/share/silk/std/ and build/share/man/ (stdlib sources and manpages)

For a compiler-only Zig build or a custom staging prefix, use:

zig build
zig build install --prefix build

To fetch or rebuild only the pinned hosted dependency archives:

make deps

Reference: Built-in dependencies

Troubleshooting#

• If a command fails, look up the error code in: Diagnostics
• If you hit backend/toolchain limits, start with: Limits

Where to go next#

• Guides: What Silk is for · Hello world · Language tour
• Formal verification: Formal Silk · Tutorial 7: Formal Silk in real code
• Language quick reference: Cheat sheet
• Standard library: Overview
• GPU: Pure-Silk CPU/GPU program · std::gpu
• Platform apps: Build LumenTrail for iOS · silk-devices(1)
• Embedding: C ABI (libsilk) · Zig embedding API
• Spec: Silk Spec (2026)