Data types

Data Types

⚠️⚠️ THIS WIKI IS BEING USED TO JOT DOWN IDEAS AT PRESENT. DON'T ASSUME ANYTHING IS FIXED. ⚠️⚠️

All placeholders, variables, commands and filters return data of a specific type. Each parameter passed to a command or filter has a data type.

The supported types are given in the following table. Each type has a default string representation and exposes a constructor that can be called using the @construct command.

All data types are immutable.

Types not yet implemented are marked with a ⛔ symbol.

Type	Description	Default string	Literal Value♤	Truthiness	Constructor Parameters☆
Text ⛔	Plain text strings	The text itself	Default string as double quoted, escaped string	All non-empty text is truthy	(1) String literal. (2) Instance of any data type: the default string is copied.
Int ⛔	32 bit integer	The integer as a base 10 string	Default string	All non-zero integers are truthy.	Integer literal.
Float ⛔	Floating point number	The floating point value rendered to full precision. Very large or small values may use scientific notation.	Default string	floats that do not test equal to zero are truthy	(1) Floating point literal. (2) Integer literal or Int instance.
Boolean ⛔	Boolean value: values are specified using commands @true and @false	"1" for true and "0" for false	Default string	@true is truthy!	(1) @true, (2) @false (3) Instance of any data type: data type's truthiness is used.
DateTime ⛔	Representation of a date and time	The ISO standard date string	Default string	Always truthy	(1) Integer literal or Int object parameters representing, in order, Year, Month, Day, Hour(⊙), Minute(⊙), Second(⊙), Millisecond(⊙). Parameters marked ⊙ are optional and default to 0. (2) string literal or Text object containing valid ISO 8601 date.
File ⛔	Represents a file in the file system	Full path to the file	Default string as double quoted, escaped string	Always truthy	(1) String literal or Text object containing full or relative path to the file. (2) Directory object specifying file's directory, followed by string literal or Text object containing file name. 🗒 Either \ or / can be used as path separators: the correct separator for the OS will be substituted automatically.
Directory ⛔	Represents a directory in the file system	Full path to the directory	Default string as double quoted, escaped string	Always truthy	String literal or Text object containing full or relative directory path. 🗒 Either \ or / can be used as path separators: the correct separator for the OS will be substituted automatically.
URL ⛔	Represents a URL	Complete URL	Default string as double quoted, escaped string	Always truthy	String literal or Text object containing complete URL. 🗒 Any illegal characters in the parameter will be correctly URL encoded.
Array ⛔	Array of values of a any type. Null elements represent unset values. 🗒 Although elements can have type OS, there is no point since all OS values are the same.	Concatenation, comma separated, of the default text values of the array elements, surrounded by square brackets	Default string	Truthy iff at least one element is truthy.	A parameter, of Any type, for each array element.
OS ⛔	Object describing the underlying operating system	OS version	none	Always truthy	None.
Any ⛔	Wraps any of the other data types.	The default string of the wrapped data type.	As wrapped type	Truthy iff the wrapped data type is truthy	An instance of data type to be wrapped.
Null ⛔	A null object. Has no value or attributes.	Empty string.	none	Always falsey	None.

♤ Literal value is the string representation of the value used for that type when writing out an Array default string.

☆ In addition to the constructor parameters listed in the table above, all data types have a copy constructor that takes an instance of the data type and creates a copy of it.

⚠️ The OS and Null data types are singletons, i.e. only one instance of each object exists. The first time their constructor are called the singleton object is constructed. Any subsequent calls to the constructors simply returns the existing instance.

🗒️ The pseudo type Number is used in the documentation. It is used to mean either an Int or a Float.

A placeholder itself has the type of the output of the last filter, or of the source if there are no filters, or Null if the ; output suppression operator was used. When a top level placeholder is rendered the data it returns is converted to text using the data type's default string representation.

Variables take the type of the value assigned to them.

The return type of @ commands varies according to the command. See the command reference for details.

The input and output types of filters depend on the filter. See the filter reference for details.

Various cast filters are provided for converting from some types to others.