# carp-lang/Carp

A statically typed lisp, without a GC, for real-time applications.

Repository: https://github.com/carp-lang/Carp
Canonical: https://ross.abutalabs.com/products/carp
Language: Haskell
License: Apache-2.0
License Family: permissive
Topics: lisp, language, game-development, games, static, typed, repl, gamedev, functional-programming, functional
Last push: 2026-08-24T18:42:47+00:00

## Health v2 (maintenance only)
Score: 80/100 (v2, computed 2026-09-03T02:20:16.233290+00:00)
- activity 99, release rhythm 45, longevity 100
- inputs: {"age_days": 3887, "days_push": 9, "days_rel": 158, "gap_med": null, "n_releases_24m": 1}
- flags: none
- formula: round(0.45*activity + 0.35*rhythm + 0.20*longevity); archived -> min(score, 10)

## Adoption (not part of the score)
Stars 6016, forks 185 (observed 2026-08-28T04:09:34.285999+00:00)

## What it is
Carp is a statically typed Lisp programming language with deterministic memory management and no garbage collector, implemented in Haskell. It targets real-time, performance-sensitive applications such as games, sound synthesis, and visualizations, with straightforward C interop and a REPL.

## Use cases
- write games in a lisp without a garbage collector
- real-time audio synthesis programming language
- statically typed functional lisp
- interactive programming with a repl and macros
- interoperate with C code from a lisp
- learn a lisp with ownership-based memory management

## When to choose
- you want lisp ergonomics with C-like performance and no GC pauses
- you are building real-time software like games or audio tools
- you value explicit allocation and deterministic memory management
- you want easy integration with existing C libraries

## When to avoid
- you need a production-ready language for critical projects - it is a research project
- you need a large ecosystem, package manager, or extensive libraries
- you prefer garbage-collected or dynamically typed languages
- you need broad platform or tooling support beyond major desktop OSes

## Facets
- artifact type: cli-tool
- maturity: experimental
- function: programming-language, compiler, interpreter
- domain: programming-languages, compilers
- platform: windows, cpp, cli
- tags: lisp, static-typing, no-gc, functional-programming, real-time, repl, ownership, c-interop, game-development, linux, macos

## Member repositories
- carp-lang/Carp (main) score 80

## Provenance
- Observed fields: from GitHub, fetched 2026-08-28T04:09:34.285999+00:00.
- Health v2: computed from the inputs above; adoption is never an input.
- Inferred fields (summary, facets, guidance): AI-extracted, prompt v1, taxonomy v1, on 2026-08-29T17:49:45.565223+00:00, confidence not recorded.
  - readme: https://github.com/carp-lang/Carp (fetched 2026-08-28T04:09:34.285999+00:00, sha cbe0a8fed7fc)
- Data as of 2026-08-30T08:39:29.467469+00:00.