oatc is a compiler for an experimental programming language called Oat.
The Oat programming language and the oatc compiler are experiments at this
point—they are not usable. The design of the programming language is subject
to frequent change. No backwards compatibility is guaranteed.
Back in late 2017, I started working on a C-like programming language. One of the goals was to prevent integer overflow at compile time—if possible. So one of the big features that I looked into adding were ranged integer types. That ended up being a failed experiment; implementing ranged integer types looked simple on the surface, but once I started looking into it further, it felt like I would be going down a rabbit hole. This language was called Bever.
Later, I pivoted towards a higher-level direction, and decided to work on a scripting language. One of the primary goals of this scripting language was that interaction with C code had to be convenient. Today, that is still a goal. This language was called Oat, and it remains named that way today. Whether Oat ends up a scripting language or not is not yet settled; it might become more low-level with time.
Back when I started with Bever, I had a "Better C" mindset: I wanted to keep the language as close to C as I could, but add some new features to help prevent mistakes. Today, making Oat be C-like is not a major concern—although the desire does creep in from time to time. It took a while to built up the courage to break away from the "Better C" mindset, but I feel like it opened up a lot of possibilities. So now I look for influence from many different places, and I feel like Oat is better off for it.