Thirsty-Lang

A governance-oriented language where admissibility is decided before execution. It is the governance DSL of Project-AI: programs declare an action and the gates it must pass, and the interpreter decides admissibility before execution.

Install · pip install thirsty-lang →Open the playground Read the specification Formal grammar

$ pip install thirsty-lang· UTF-8 · 6-tier (AC0–AC5) governance · tl CLI

A first program

intent "send_outbound_mail";

capability OUT_MAIL { scope: 200, class: AC2 }

action "outbound" {
  gate "capability" {
    require scope <= 12000 else deny "scope exceeds cap"
    require authority >= AC2 else deny "insufficient authority"
  }
  gate "continuity" {
    require gap_days < 30 else halt "continuity gap too large"
  }
  commit;   // ALLOW
}

Thirsty-Lang reads top to bottom. An intent and its capability are declared, then require statements act as invariants. The first failing requirement ends the program with DENY or SAFE_HALT. Only when execution reaches commit is the action ALLOWED.

At a glance

Paradigm: Declarative governance / deny-by-default control flow
File extension: .tl
Compilation: Shadow → Canonical
Version: 0.8.1

Design principles

Deny-by-default

A program is inadmissible until it reaches commit. Reaching the end without commit is a DENY, not a pass. There is no implicit allow.

Governance before execution

Every meaningful action is a sequence of gates evaluated up front. The verdict is decided before anything runs, not audited afterward.

Three terminal verdicts

Programs resolve to exactly one of ALLOW (commit), DENY (rejected, system safe), or SAFE_HALT (terminal refusal on a safety-critical invariant).

Replay-friendly audit

Each run emits a deterministic decision hash and a step-by-step trace. Identical input yields an identical hash — verdicts are reproducible.

Path to an adoptable standard

What a language needs to be taken seriously: a working implementation, a formal grammar, a conformance suite, a written specification, and a versioned standard. Honest status below — built, draft, or planned.

Requirement	Status	Note
Reference implementation	BUILT	Lexer → parser → tree-walking interpreter, in-browser.
Packaged distribution	BUILT	Live on PyPI, Docker Hub, and GHCR at v0.8.1 (pip install thirsty-lang).
Formal grammar (EBNF)	BUILT	Complete grammar for the v0.8.1 surface.
Conformance test suite	BUILT	Interpreter + example programs under CI.
Language specification	DRAFT	Keyword reference and context model; full prose spec pending upload.
Standard library	PLANNED	Capability templates, invariant macros.
TSCG-B binary form	PLANNED	Binary governance representation + Shadow → Canonical compiler.
Versioned standard / RFC	PLANNED	Numbered standard for universal adoption.

When the improved, universally-adoptable language definition is uploaded, the specification and grammar pages update from a single source of truth.