From 5481ec020eabce663b5e7423c5e217005df6ad49 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001
From: Irene Knapp <ireneista@irenes.space>
Date: Fri, 8 May 2026 02:31:09 -0700
Subject: add a rough draft of a self-hosted "interpret"

Force-Push: yes
Change-Id: I063232ca7d840237f53dc805bc896c7b452cedc8
---
 interpret.e | 59 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
 1 file changed, 59 insertions(+)
 create mode 100644 interpret.e

(limited to 'interpret.e')

diff --git a/interpret.e b/interpret.e
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..1270429
--- /dev/null
+++ b/interpret.e
@@ -0,0 +1,59 @@
+~ Now the single most important word...
+: funterpret
+  word
+
+  ~ If no word was returned, exit.
+  dup 0 = { drop exit } if
+
+  ~ The string is on the top of the stack, so to get a pointer to it we get
+  ~ the stack address.
+  ~ (string)
+  value@ dup emitstring newline find
+
+  ~ Check whether the word was found in the dictionary.
+  dup 0 != {
+    ~ If the word is in the dictionary, check what mode we're in, then...
+    dropstring-with-result
+    ~ (entry pointer)
+    interpreter-flags @ 0x01 & {
+      ~ ... if we're in compile mode, there's still a chance it's an immediate
+      ~ word, in which case we fall through to interpret mode...
+      dup entry-flags@ 1 & 0 =
+
+      ~ ... but it's a regular word, so append it to the heap.
+      { entry-to-execution-token , exit } if
+    } if
+
+    ~ ... if we're in interpret mode, or the word is immediate, run it.
+    entry-to-execution-token execute exit
+  } if
+
+  ~ If it's not in the dictionary, check whether it's a decimal number.
+  drop
+  ~ As before, we get the stack address and use it as a string pointer.
+  ~ (string)
+  value@ read-integer 0 = {
+    ~ It's a number.
+    interpreter-flags @ 0x01 & {
+      ~ We're in compile mode; append first "lit", then the number, to the
+      ~ heap. The version of "lit" we use is the one that's current when we
+      ~ ourselves are compiled, hardcoded; doing a dynamic lookup would
+      ~ require dealing with what happens if it's not found.
+      dropstring-with-result
+      [ ' lit entry-to-execution-token literal ]
+      , ,
+      exit
+    } if
+
+    ~ We're in interpret mode; push the number to the stack. Or at least, that's
+    ~ what the code we're interpreting will see. Really it's already on the
+    ~ stack, just clean everything else up and leave it there.
+    dropstring-with-result exit
+  } if
+
+  ~ If it's neither in the dictionary nor a number, just print an error.
+  s" No such word: " emitstring value@ emitstring dropstring exit ;
+
+: funquit { funterpret } forever ;
+
+funquit 4 5 + . bye
-- 
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