While Hoon has a large amount of sugar syntax, some forms that may look irregular are actually regular wing syntax or another language feature, such as ,.

When in doubt, you can use the !, zapcom rune to determine the AST to which Hoon parses an expression.

> !,(*hoon c.b.a)
[%wing p=~[%c %b %a]]

Quick Lookup of Irregular Forms

Reading guide

Headings contain runes, phonetics and tokens. Description contains a link to the docs and a short description of the rune. Both regular and irregular forms are given.

Want to Ctrl-f to find out the meaning of something weird you saw? Search for \symbol. ie \? or \=. It'll show you to the irregular forms that uses that symbol.

. dot (nock)

Anything Nock can do, Hoon can do also.

.+ dotlus

docs \+

[%dtls p=atom]: increment an atom with Nock 4.

Regular: .+(p)

Irregular: +(p)

.= dottis

docs \=

[%dtts p=hoon q=hoon]: test for equality with Nock 5.

Regular: .=(p q)

Irregular: =(p q)

; mic (make)

Miscellaneous useful macros.

;: miccol

docs \:

[%mccl p=hoon q=(list hoon)]: call a binary function as an n-ary function.

Regular: ;:(p q)

Irregular: :(p q)

: col (cells)

The cell runes.

:- colhep

docs \[\]\^\/\+\`\~

[%clhp p=hoon q=hoon]: construct a cell (2-tuple).

Regular: :-(p q)

Irregular:

  [a b]   ==>   :-(a b)
[a b c]   ==>   [a [b c]]
  a^b^c   ==>   [a b c]
    a/b   ==>   [%a b]
    a+b   ==>   [%a b]
     `a   ==>   [~ a]
 ~[a b]   ==>   [a b ~]
  [a b]~  ==>   [[a b] ~]

= tis (flow)

Flow hoons change the subject. All non-flow hoons (except cores) pass the subject down unchanged.

=< tisgal

docs \:

[%tsgl p=hoon q=hoon]: compose two hoons, inverted.

Regular: =<(p q)

Irregular: p:q

| bar (core)

docs \$

Core hoons are flow hoon.

Technically not irregular syntax, but worth mentioning.

• |= bartis
• |. bardot
• |- barhep
• |* bartar

The above runes produce a core with a single arm, named $ ("buc"). We can recompute this arm with changes, useful for recursion among other things. Commonly used with the irregular syntax for %=, :make, like so: $().

% cen (call)

The invocation family of runes.

%= centis

docs \(\)

[%cnts p=wing q=(list (pair wing hoon))]: take a wing with changes.

Regular: %=(p a 1)

Irregular: p(a 1)

%~ censig

docs \~

[%cnsg p=wing q=hoon r=hoon]: call with multi-armed door.

Regular: %~(p q r)

Irregular: ~(p q r)

%- cenhep

docs \(\)

[%cnhp p=hoon q=hoon]: call a gate (function).

Regular: %-(p q)

Irregular: (p q)

Note: (p) becomes $:p (=<($ p)), which behaves as you would expect (func call w/o args).

$ buc (mold)

A mold is a gate (function) that helps us build simple and rigorous data structures.

$? bucwut

docs \?

[%bcwt p=(list model)]: mold which normalizes a general union.

Regular: $?(p)

Irregular: ?(p)

$_ buccab

docs \_

[%bccb p=value]: mold which normalizes to an example.

Regular: $_(p)

Irregular: _p

$= buctis

docs \=

[%bcts p=skin q=spec]: wraps a face around a structure.

Regular: $=(p q)

Irregular:

 p=q   ==>   $=(p q)
  =q   ==>   q=q
=p=q   ==>   p-q=q

? wut (test)

Hoon has the usual branches and logical tests.

?! wutzap

docs \!

[%wtzp p=hoon]: logical not.

Regular: ?!(p)

Irregular: !(p)

?& wutpam

docs \&

[%wtpm p=(list hoon)]: logical and.

Regular: ?&(p)

Irregular: &(p)

?| wutbar

docs \|

[%wtbr p=(list hoon)]: logical or.

Regular: ?|(p)

Irregular: |(p)

^ ket (cast)

Lets us adjust types without violating type constraints.

^: ketcol

docs \,

[%ktcl p=spec]: mold gate for type p.

Regular: ^:(p)

Irregular: ,p

^- kethep

docs \`

[%kthp p=model q=value]: typecast by mold.

Regular: ^-(p q)

Irregular: `p`q

^* kettar

docs \*

[%kttr p=spec]: produce bunt value of mold.

Regular: ^*(p)

Irregular: *p

^= kettis

docs \=

[%ktts p=toga q=value]: name a value.

Regular: ^=(p q)

Irregular: p=q

Miscellaneous

Trivial molds

\*\@\^\?\~

• * noun.
• @ atom.
• ^ cell.
• ? loobean.
• ~ null.

Values

\~\&\|\%

• ~ null.
• & loobean true.
• | loobean false.
• %a constant a, where a can be an ((ir)regularly defined) atom or a symbol.

See %sand for other irregular definitions of atoms.

List addressing

\&\|

• &n nth element of a list.
• |n tail of list after nth element (i.e. n is the head).

Limbs

docs \+\.\^\-

[%limb p=(each @ud [p=@ud q=@tas])]: attribute of subject.

• +15 is slot 15
• . is the whole subject (slot 1)
• ^a is the a "of a higher scope", i.e. "resolve variable a, ignoring the first one found".
• ^^p even higher, etc.
• 'Lark' syntax for slots / tree addressing:

+1
+2 -
+3 +
+4 -<
+5 ->
+6 +<
+7 +>
+8 -<-
...

Wings

docs \.

[%wing p=(list limb)]; a limb search path.

a.b finds limb a within limb b ("var" a within "var" b).

Printing stuff

\<\>

• >a b c< produces a tank of the output of the contents (wrapped in cell if more than 1 item), formatted in pretty-print.

  > >1 2 3<
  [%rose p=[p=" " q="[" r="]"] q=~[[%leaf p="1"] [%leaf p="2"] [%leaf p="3"]]]

• <a b c> produces a tape of the tank above (ie <1 2 3> is same as ~(ram re >1 2 3<)).

  > <1 2 3>
  "[1 2 3]"
  
  > <`(list @)`~[1 2 3]>
  "~[1 2 3]"

, com

, can serve in several capacities in Hoon programs:

1. As sugar for the ^: ketcol or $; bucmic runes, toggling structure and value mode. (Toggling out of structure mode is uncommon.)

   > !,(*hoon ,[@t @t])
   [ %ktcl
     p=[%bccl p=[i=[%base p=[%atom p=~.t]] t=[i=[%base p=[%atom p=~.t]] t=~]]]
   ]
   
   > !,(*hoon |=(a=,[@t @t] b))
   [ %brts
       p
     [ %bcts
       p=term=%a
         q
       [ %bcmc
         p=[%cltr p=[i=[%base p=[%atom p=~.t]] t=[i=[%base p=[%atom p=~.t]] t=~]]]
       ]
     ]
     q=[%cnts p=~[[%.y p=2] %a] q=~]
   ]
   
   > !,(*hoon ,,[@t @t])
   [ %ktcl
       p
     [ %bcmc
       p=[%cltr p=[i=[%base p=[%atom p=~.t]] t=[i=[%base p=[%atom p=~.t]] t=~]]]
     ]
   ]

   ($; bucmic, or manual value mode, allows the use of value mode syntax to construct a mold. Concretely, it lets you build a mold out of hoon instead of out of spec. It is not commonly used.)

   From value mode to structure mode:

   [%ktcl p=spec]

   From structure mode to value mode:

   [%bcmc p=hoon]

2. As wing syntax for stripping a face.

   For instance, a line similar to the following is present in many Gall agents receiving HTTP requests via Eyre:

   =/  ,request-line:server  (parse-request-line:server url.request.inbound-request)

   This , lets you avoid using an outer face when handling the result.

   > =/  ,@ud  1
     -
   1
   > !,(*hoon =/(,@ud 1 -))
   [ %tsfs
     p=[%spec spec=[%bcmc p=[%base p=[%atom p=~.ud]]] skin=[%base base=%noun]]
     q=[%sand p=%ud q=1]
     r=[%cnts p=~[[%.y p=2]] q=~]
   ]

3. As a separator, e.g. between pairs in an inline %= centis expression, $(i +(i), j (dec j)).

Commentary

In our in-house examples throughout our documentation, we use irregular forms instead of regular for the sake of verbosity. But remember with irregular forms: everything is just runes! Like magic. In general, irregular forms (usually) read better, but of course regular forms provide more information about what you're doing by showing you the full rune. Of course, it's up to you, the Hoon programmer, as to whether or not you want to use these.