Guide

CLI & flags

One binary, klainmain. Point it at a file; tune the trade-offs per compile.

usage

klainmain [flags] <file.ts>

# Compile to a native binary (does NOT run it)
$ klainmain app.ts

# Compile and run in one step
$ make run FILE=app.ts

# Inspect the generated LLVM IR
$ make ir FILE=app.ts

Flags

Flag	What it does
`--emit-llvm`	Emit LLVM IR to stdout and stop — don't compile.
`-o <name>`	Output binary name (default: input path without `.ts`).
`--static`	Build a self-contained binary — the non-system libraries link statically instead of as dynamic dependencies. Linux: fully static (incl. libc), for a scratch/distroless image. Windows: statically links the mingw runtime, `pcre2`, and the `libcurl` chain, so the `.exe` needs no DLLs beside it (the UCRT and core Win32 DLLs stay dynamic — they ship with Windows 10/11). macOS: refuses cleanly (no static libSystem). Without it, builds are dynamic on every platform.
`-mm <mode>`	Memory management: `manual` (default — `Memory.free(x)` only) or `gc` (Boehm GC, needs `bdw-gc`). Identical on Linux and macOS.
`-bigint <lib>`	BigInt backend, linked only when used: `libtommath` (default) or `gmp`. Identical semantics — trades license/speed.
`-crypto <lib>`	`crypto.subtle` backend: `openssl` (default) or `commoncrypto` (macOS only, no OpenSSL dependency).
`-compat <m>`	`strict` (default — opinionated, safer-than-JS) or `js` (best-effort JS-faithful, e.g. global shadowing).
`-regex <m>`	RegExp dialect: `es-unicode` (default) / `ecmascript` / `es-utf16` / `es-ascii` / `pcre`.

Linking, briefly

Programs are pure libc by default. A binary only links an extra library when it actually uses the feature — libcurl for fetch/http.listen, libnghttp2 for http.listen, libpcre2 for RegExp, OpenSSL for crypto.subtle/tls. By default those are dynamic dependencies — closer to typical C/C++ toolchain output than a self-contained Go binary — so a dynamic binary assumes the target machine has them (the same assumption on every platform: a Linux binary needs libcurl.so present, a Windows one needs the DLL).

Pass --static when you want a single self-contained binary that runs anywhere with no external dependency. That's the flag to build a distributable CLI/TUI tool or a desktop app — it's how the showcase apps are built. Without it, distributing a dynamic build is a packaging step: on Linux/macOS you declare the dependency (apt/Homebrew), on Windows you bundle the required DLLs alongside the .exe (or, where a license forbids redistribution, point users to the vendor's download).

Left in manual mode, a program's memory footprint is a monotonically increasing function of its runtime — a feature for short-lived CLI tools, a life choice for anything long-running. Want automatic collection? Pass -mm=gc.

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