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Installation

With VS Code​

The easiest way to set up Raven is using the VS Code editor extension. Install the Raven plugin. Then open the command palette (View -> Command Palette...) and run Raven: Add Terminal Command. The raven command will then be available in new terminals (if you already have a terminal open, you may need to relaunch it).

The extension also provides syntax highlighting, diagnostics and formatting for .rv files.

With Node.js​

If you want to use Raven outside of VS Code, install Node.js and then add the Raven package globally. It doesn't matter how you install Node, but here's my recommended setup:

  • Windows: Run winget install -e --id OpenJS.NodeJS in a terminal.
  • MacOS: Set up Homebrew and run brew install node.
  • Linux: Set up fnm with curl -fsSL https://fnm.vercel.app/install | bash, restart your shell, then fnm install 25.

Once you have Node, it's just:

npm i -g @unkindnesses/raven

and the raven command is ready to go. Raven has no other run-time dependencies.

From source​

For those who want the latest and greatest, or to tweak Raven's own code, it's easy to clone the repo and go; you'll still need Node as above.

git clone https://github.com/Unkindnesses/raven
cd raven
npm install
npm run build
npm i -g .

The final npm i puts raven on your path, just like the packaged install. See Contributing for more on the development workflow.

Checking it works​

$ raven
> 2+2
4

If you see the prompt, you're set – continue to Hello, Raven.