todo.md

Luma Language Compiler TODO

✅ Implemented (Up to Codegen)

These AST node types are fully implemented in code generation:

Expressions

• AST_EXPR_LITERAL
• AST_EXPR_IDENTIFIER
• AST_EXPR_BINARY
• AST_EXPR_UNARY
• AST_EXPR_CALL
• AST_EXPR_ASSIGNMENT
• AST_EXPR_GROUPING
• AST_EXPR_CAST
• AST_EXPR_SIZEOF
• AST_EXPR_ALLOC
• AST_EXPR_FREE
• AST_EXPR_DEREF
• AST_EXPR_ADDR
• AST_EXPR_MEMBER
• AST_EXPR_INC
• AST_EXPR_DEC

Statements

• AST_PROGRAM (multi-module support)
• AST_PREPROCESSOR_MODULE
• AST_PREPROCESSOR_USE
• AST_STMT_EXPRESSION
• AST_STMT_VAR_DECL
• AST_STMT_FUNCTION
• AST_STMT_RETURN
• AST_STMT_BLOCK
• AST_STMT_IF
• AST_STMT_PRINT
• AST_STMT_DEFER
• AST_STMT_LOOP (this is for, while, and while-true)
• AST_STMT_IMPL

Types

• AST_TYPE_BASIC
• AST_TYPE_POINTER
• AST_TYPE_ARRAY
• AST_TYPE_FUNCTION
• AST_TYPE_SET
• AST_TYPE_SOME

---

🧠 Static Memory Analysis

✅ Currently Implemented

• Basic allocation/free tracking by variable name
• Memory leak detection (allocated but never freed)
• Double-free detection with count tracking
• Integration with defer statements
• Detailed error reporting with source locations
• Anonymous allocation filtering

🔧 Memory Analysis Improvements Needed

High Priority

• Pointer aliasing detection
• Track when ptr2 = ptr1 creates aliases
• Warn when analyzer can't track aliased pointers
• Consider ownership transfer semantics
• Allowing structs to point to itself -- name struct {some: *name};

Control Flow Analysis

• Conditional path tracking
• Detect leaks in conditional branches (if/else without free in all paths)
• Handle early returns and breaks
• Track memory across loop iterations

Function Call Analysis

• Cross-function tracking
• Track pointers passed to functions as parameters
• Handle functions that free parameters
• Return value allocation tracking
• Support for ownership transfer through function calls

Advanced Pointer Operations

• Complex pointer arithmetic
• Handle ptr + offset operations
• Track array element allocations
• Detect out-of-bounds access potential

Memory Operation Extensions

• Additional memory functions
• Track realloc() operations
• Handle calloc() and malloc() variants
• Monitor memcpy() for potential use-after-free

Data Structure Tracking

• Struct/array memory management
• Track allocations within struct members
• Handle nested pointer structures
• Monitor array of pointers

Use-After-Free Detection

• Access after free tracking
• Detect reads/writes to freed pointers
• Track freed pointer usage across scopes
• Integration with dereference operations

Scope and Lifetime Analysis

• Advanced scope tracking
• Detect pointers escaping local scope
• Handle static/global pointer lifetimes
• Stack vs heap allocation analysis

---

📝 Next Steps

Parsing

• Add parsing for templates (fn[T], struct[T])
• Add parsing for type aliases using type keyword
• Add parsing for modules and imports refinements
• Design and implement union syntax
• Consider Go/Odin-style loop syntax improvements

Semantic Analysis

• Type inference for generics
• Detect unused imports and symbols

Codegen

• Implement codegen for switch or match constructs
• Support more LLVM optimizations
• Add structs and enums support in codegen
• Add unions support in codegen
• Add in memcpy and streq streq === strcmp

Lexer & Parser

• Add tokens and grammar for unions

Type Checker

• Implement type checking for structs
• Implement type checking for unions

---

🚀 Future Features Ideas (Maybe)

• Investigate pattern matching
• Build minimal standard library
• Consider ownership/borrowing system for advanced memory safety
• Explore compile-time memory layout optimization