Nim Compiler User Guide

Source Edit
Author: Andreas Rumpf
Version: 2.3.1

"Look at you, hacker. A pathetic creature of meat and bone, panting and sweating as you run through
my corridors. How can you challenge a perfect, immortal machine?"

Introduction

This document describes the usage of the Nim compiler on the different supported platforms. It is
not a definition of the Nim programming language (which is covered in the manual).
Nim is free software; it is licensed under the MIT License.

Compiler Usage

Command-line switches
All options that take a PATH or DIR argument are subject to path substitution:
$nim : The global nim prefix path
$lib : The stdlib path
$home and ~ : The user's home path
$config : The directory of the module currently being compiled
$projectname : The project file's name without file extension
$projectpath and $projectdir : The project file's path
$nimcache : The nimcache path

Basic command-line switches are:

Usage:

nim command [options] [projectfile] [arguments]

Command:

compile, c compile project with default code generator (C)

r compile to $nimcache/projname, run with arguments using
backend specified by --backend (default: c)
doc generate the documentation for inputfile for backend specified by -
-backend (default: c)

Arguments: arguments are passed to the program being run (if --run option is selected)
Options:

-p, --path:PATH add path to search paths

-d, --define:SYMBOL(:VAL)
define a conditional symbol (Optionally: Define the value for that
symbol, see: "compile time define pragmas")
-u, --undef:SYMBOL undefine a conditional symbol
-f, --forceBuild:on|off
force rebuilding of all modules
--stackTrace:on|off turn stack tracing on|off
--lineTrace:on|off turn line tracing on|off
--threads:on|off turn support for multi-threading on|off
-x, --checks:on|off turn all runtime checks on|off
-a, --assertions:on|off
turn assertions on|off
--opt:none|speed|size
optimize not at all or for speed|size Note: use -d:release for a
release build!
--debugger:native use native debugger (gdb)
--app:console|gui|lib|staticlib
generate a console app|GUI app|DLL|static library
-r, --run run the compiled program with given arguments
--eval:cmd evaluate nim code directly; e.g.: nim --eval:"echo 1" defaults to
e (nimscript) but customizable: nim r --eval:'for a in stdin.l
ines: echo a'
--fullhelp show all command line switches
-h, --help show this help
-v, --version show detailed version information

Note, single letter options that take an argument require a colon. E.g. -p:PATH.
Advanced command-line switches are:
Advanced commands:
compileToC, cc compile project with C code generator
compileToCpp, cpp compile project to C++ code
compileToOC, objc compile project to Objective C code
js compile project to Javascript
nif compile project to NIF
e run a Nimscript file
md2html convert a Markdown file to HTML use --docCmd:skip to skip
compiling snippets
rst2html convert a reStructuredText file to HTML use --docCmd:skip to skip
compiling snippets
md2tex convert a Markdown file to LaTeX
rst2tex convert a reStructuredText file to LaTeX
doc2tex extract the documentation to a LaTeX file
jsondoc extract the documentation to a json file
ctags create a tags file
buildIndex build an index for the whole documentation
genDepend generate a DOT file containing the module dependency graph
dump dump all defined conditionals and search paths see also: --
dump.format:json (useful with: | jq )
check checks the project for syntax and semantics (can be combined with -
-defusages)

Runtime checks (see -x):

--objChecks:on|off turn obj conversion checks on|off

--fieldChecks:on|off
turn case variant field checks on|off
--rangeChecks:on|off
turn range checks on|off
--boundChecks:on|off
turn bound checks on|off
--overflowChecks:on|off
turn int over-/underflow checks on|off
--floatChecks:on|off
 turn all floating point (NaN/Inf) checks on|off
--nanChecks:on|off turn NaN checks on|off
--infChecks:on|off turn Inf checks on|off

Advanced options:

--defusages:FILE,LINE,COL
find the definition and all usages of a symbol
-o:FILE, --out:FILE set the output filename
--outdir:DIR set the path where the output file will be written
--usenimcache will use outdir=$$nimcache , whichever it resolves to after all
options have been processed
--stdout:on|off output to stdout
--colors:on|off turn compiler messages coloring on|off
--filenames:abs|canonical|legacyRelProj
customize how filenames are rendered in compiler messages,
defaults to abs (absolute)
--processing:dots|filenames|off
show files as they're being processed by nim compiler
--unitsep:on|off use the ASCII unit separator (31) between error messages, useful
for IDE-like tooling
--declaredLocs:on|off
show declaration locations in messages
--spellSuggest:num show at most num >= 0 spelling suggestions on typos. if num is not
specified (or auto ), return an implementation defined set of
suggestions.
--hints:on|off|list on|off enables or disables hints. list reports which hints are
selected.
--hint:X:on|off turn specific hint X on|off. hint:X means hint:X:on , as with
similar flags. all is the set of all hints (only all:off is supported).
--hintAsError:X:on|off
turn specific hint X into an error on|off
-w:on|off|list, --warnings:on|off|list
on|off enables or disables warnings. list reports which warnings
are selected.
--warning:X:on|off turn specific warning X on|off. warning:X means warning:X:on , as
with similar flags. all is the set of all warning (only all:off is
supported).
--warningAsError:X:on|off
 turn specific warning X into an error on|off
--styleCheck:off|hint|error
produce hints or errors for Nim identifiers that do not adhere to
Nim's official style guide https://nim-lang.org/docs/nep1.html
--styleCheck:usages only enforce consistent spellings of identifiers, do not enforce the
style on declarations
--showAllMismatches:on|off
show all mismatching candidates in overloading resolution
--lib:PATH set the system library path
--import:PATH add an automatically imported module see also patchFile in
nimscript which offers more flexibility.
--include:PATH add an automatically included module
--nimcache:PATH set the path used for generated files see also https://nim-
lang.org/docs/nimc.html#compiler-usage-generated-c-code-
directory
-c, --compileOnly:on|off
compile Nim files only; do not assemble or link
--noLinking:on|off compile Nim and generated files but do not link
--noMain:on|off do not generate a main procedure
--genScript:on|off generate a compile script (in the 'nimcache' subdirectory named
'compile_$$project$$scriptext'), and a '.deps' file containing the
dependencies; implies --compileOnly
--os:SYMBOL set the target operating system (cross-compilation)
--cpu:SYMBOL set the target processor (cross-compilation)
--debuginfo:on|off enables debug information
-t, --passC:OPTION pass an option to the C compiler
-l, --passL:OPTION pass an option to the linker
--cc:SYMBOL specify the C compiler
--cincludes:DIR modify the C compiler header search path
--clibdir:DIR modify the linker library search path
--clib:LIBNAME link an additional C library (you should omit platform-specific
extensions)
--project document the whole project (doc)
--docRoot:path nim doc --docRoot:/foo --project --outdir:docs /foo/sub/m
ain.nim generates: docs/sub/main.html if path == @pkg, will use
nimble file enclosing dir if path == @path, will use first matching dir
in --path if path == @default (the default and most useful), will use
 best match among @pkg,@path. if these are nonexistent, will use
project path
-b, --backend:c|cpp|js|objc
sets backend to use with commands like nim doc or nim r
--docCmd:cmd if cmd == skip , skips runnableExamples else, runs
runnableExamples with given options, e.g.: --docCmd:"-d:foo --th
reads:on"
--docSeeSrcUrl:url activate 'see source' for doc command (see doc.item.seesrc in
config/nimdoc.cfg)
--docInternal also generate documentation for non-exported symbols
--lineDir:on|off generation of #line directive on|off
--embedsrc:on|off embeds the original source code as comments in the generated
output
--tlsEmulation:on|off
turn thread local storage emulation on|off
--implicitStatic:on|off
turn implicit compile time evaluation on|off
--trmacros:on|off turn term rewriting macros on|off
--multimethods:on|off
turn multi-methods on|off
--hotCodeReloading:on|off
turn support for hot code reloading on|off
--excessiveStackTrace:on|off
stack traces use full file paths
--stackTraceMsgs:on|off
enable user defined stack frame msgs via setFrameMsg
--skipCfg:on|off do not read the nim installation's configuration file
--skipUserCfg:on|off
do not read the user's configuration file
--skipParentCfg:on|off
do not read the parent dirs' configuration files
--skipProjCfg:on|off
do not read the project's configuration file
--mm:orc|arc|refc|markAndSweep|boehm|go|none|regions
select which memory management to use; default is 'orc'
--exceptions:setjmp|cpp|goto|quirky
select the exception handling implementation
--index:on|off|only docgen: turn index file generation on|off ( only means not generate
 output files like HTML)
--noImportdoc:on|off
turn loading documentation .idx files on|off
--putenv:key=value set an environment variable
--NimblePath:PATH add a path for Nimble support
--noNimblePath deactivate the Nimble path
--clearNimblePath empty the list of Nimble package search paths
--cppCompileToNamespace:namespace
use the provided namespace for the generated C++ code, if no
namespace is provided "Nim" will be used
--nimMainPrefix:prefix
use {prefix}NimMain instead of NimMain in the produced C/C++
code
--expandMacro:MACRO dump every generated AST from MACRO
--expandArc:PROCNAME
show how PROCNAME looks like after diverse optimizations before
the final backend phase (mostly ARC/ORC specific)
--excludePath:PATH exclude a path from the list of search paths
--dynlibOverride:SYMBOL
marks SYMBOL so that dynlib:SYMBOL has no effect and can be
statically linked instead; symbol matching is fuzzy so that --
dynlibOverride:lua matches dynlib: "liblua.so.3"
--dynlibOverrideAll disables the effects of the dynlib pragma
--listCmd list the compilation commands; can be combined with --hint:exe
c:on and --hint:link:on
--asm produce assembler code
--parallelBuild:0|1|...
perform a parallel build value = number of processors (0 for auto-
detect)
--incremental:on|off
only recompile the changed modules (experimental!)
--verbosity:0|1|2|3 set Nim's verbosity level (1 is default)
--errorMax:N stop compilation after N errors; 0 means unlimited
--maxLoopIterationsVM:N
set max iterations for all VM loops
--maxCallDepthVM:N set max call depth in the VM
--experimental:$1 enable experimental language feature
 --legacy:$2 enable obsolete/legacy language feature
--benchmarkVM:on|off
turn benchmarking of VM code with cpuTime() on|off
--profileVM:on|off turn compile time VM profiler on|off
--panics:on|off turn panics into process terminations (default: off)
--deepcopy:on|off enable 'system.deepCopy' for --mm:arc|orc
--jsbigint64:on|off toggle the use of BigInt for 64-bit integers for the JavaScript
backend (default: on)
--nimBasePattern:nimbase.h
allows to specify a custom pattern for nimbase.h

List of warnings
Each warning can be activated individually with --warning:NAME:on|off or in a push pragma
with {.warning[NAME]:on|off.} .
Name Description
CannotOpenFile Some file not essential for the compiler's working could not be opened.
OctalEscape The code contains an unsupported octal sequence.
Deprecated The code uses a deprecated symbol.
ConfigDeprecated The project makes use of a deprecated config file.
SmallLshouldNotBeUsed The letter 'l' should not be used as an identifier.
EachIdentIsTuple The code contains a confusing var declaration.
CStringConv Warn about dangerous implicit conversions to cstring .
EnumConv Warn about conversions from enum to enum.
AnyEnumConv Warn about any conversions to an enum type.
HoleEnumConv Warn about conversion to an enum with holes. These conversions are unsafe.
ResultUsed Warn about the usage of the built-in result variable.
User Some user-defined warning.

List of hints
Each hint can be activated individually with --hint:NAME:on|off or in a push pragma with {.hin
t[NAME]:on|off.} .
Name Description
CC Shows when the C compiler is called.
CodeBegin
CodeEnd
CondTrue
Conf A config file was loaded.
ConvToBaseNotNeeded
ConvFromXtoItselfNotNeeded
Dependency
 Exec Program is executed.
ExprAlwaysX
ExtendedContext
GCStats Dumps statistics about the Garbage Collector.
GlobalVar Shows global variables declarations.
Link Linking phase.
Name
Path Search paths modifications.
Pattern
Performance
Processing Artifact being compiled.
QuitCalled
Source The source line that triggered a diagnostic message.
StackTrace
Success, SuccessX Successful compilation of a library or a binary.
User
UserRaw
XDeclaredButNotUsed Unused symbols in the code.

Verbosity levels
Level Description
0 Minimal output level for the compiler.
Displays compilation of all the compiled files, including those imported by other modules or
1
through the compile pragma. This is the default level.
Displays compilation statistics, enumerates the dynamic libraries that will be loaded by the final
2 binary, and dumps to standard output the result of applying a filter to the source code if any filter
was used during compilation.
3 In addition to the previous levels dumps a debug stack trace for compiler developers.

Compile-time symbols
Through the -d:x or --define:x switch you can define compile-time symbols for conditional
compilation. The defined switches can be checked in source code with the when statement and
defined proc. The typical use of this switch is to enable builds in release mode ( -d:release ) where
optimizations are enabled for better performance. Another common use is the -d:ssl switch to
activate SSL sockets.
Additionally, you may pass a value along with the symbol: -d:x=y which may be used in
conjunction with the compile-time define pragmas to override symbols during build time.
Compile-time symbols are completely case insensitive and underscores are ignored too. --defin
e:FOO and --define:foo are identical.
Compile-time symbols starting with the nim prefix are reserved for the implementation and
should not be used elsewhere.
Name Description
 Use the standard setjmp()/longjmp() library functions for setjmp-based exceptions.
nimStdSetjmp
This is the default on most platforms.
nimSigSetjmp Use sigsetjmp()/siglongjmp() for setjmp-based exceptions.
Use _setjmp()/_longjmp() on POSIX and _setjmp()/longjmp() on Windows, for
nimRawSetjmp setjmp-based exceptions. It's the default on BSDs and BSD-like platforms, where it's
significantly faster than the standard functions.
Use __builtin_setjmp()/__builtin_longjmp() for setjmp-based exceptions. This
nimBuiltinSetjmp will not work if an exception is being thrown and caught inside the same procedure.
Useful for benchmarking.

Configuration files
Note: The project file name is the name of the .nim file that is passed as a command-line argument
to the compiler.
The nim executable processes configuration files in the following directories (in this order; later
files overwrite previous settings):
1. $nim/config/nim.cfg , /etc/nim/nim.cfg (UNIX) or <Nim's installation directory>\con
fig\nim.cfg (Windows). This file can be skipped with the --skipCfg command line option.
2. If environment variable XDG_CONFIG_HOME is defined, $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/nim/nim.cfg or ~/.c
onfig/nim/nim.cfg (POSIX) or %APPDATA%/nim/nim.cfg (Windows). This file can be skipped
with the --skipUserCfg command line option.
3. $parentDir/nim.cfg where $parentDir stands for any parent directory of the project file's
path. These files can be skipped with the --skipParentCfg command-line option.
4. $projectDir/nim.cfg where $projectDir stands for the project file's path. This file can be
skipped with the --skipProjCfg command-line option.
5. A project can also have a project-specific configuration file named $project.nim.cfg that
resides in the same directory as $project.nim . This file can be skipped with the --skipProjCf
g command-line option.

Command-line settings have priority over configuration file settings.

The default build of a project is a debug build. To compile a release build define the release
symbol:

nim c -d:release myproject.nim

To compile a dangerous release build define the danger symbol:

nim c -d:danger myproject.nim

Search path handling

Nim has the concept of a global search path (PATH) that is queried to determine where to find
imported modules or include files. If multiple files are found an ambiguity error is produced.
nim dump shows the contents of the PATH.
However before the PATH is used the current directory is checked for the file's existence. So if
PATH contains $lib and $lib/bar and the directory structure looks like this:

$lib/x.nim
$lib/bar/x.nim
foo/x.nim
foo/main.nim
other.nim

And main imports x , foo/x is imported. If other imports x then both $lib/x.nim and $lib/ba
r/x.nim match but $lib/x.nim is used as it is the first match.

Generated C code directory

The generated files that Nim produces all go into a subdirectory called nimcache . Its full path is
$XDG_CACHE_HOME/nim/$projectname(_r|_d) or ~/.cache/nim/$projectname(_r|_d) on
Posix
$HOME\nimcache\$projectname(_r|_d) on Windows.

The _r suffix is used for release builds, _d is for debug builds.

This makes it easy to delete all generated files.
The --nimcache compiler switch can be used to to change the nimcache directory.
However, the generated C code is not platform-independent. C code generated for Linux does not
compile on Windows, for instance. The comment on top of the C file lists the OS, CPU, and CC the
file has been compiled for.

Compiler Selection

To change the compiler from the default compiler (at the command line):

nim c --cc:llvm_gcc --compile_only myfile.nim

This uses the configuration defined in config\nim.cfg for llvm_gcc .

If nimcache already contains compiled code from a different compiler for the same project, add the
-f flag to force all files to be recompiled.
The default compiler is defined at the top of config\nim.cfg . Changing this setting affects the
compiler used by koch to (re)build Nim.
To use the CC environment variable, use nim c --cc:env myfile.nim . To use the CXX
environment variable, use nim cpp --cc:env myfile.nim . --cc:env is available since Nim
version 1.4.

Cross-compilation

To cross compile, use for example:

nim c --cpu:i386 --os:linux --compileOnly --genScript myproject.nim

Then move the C code and the compile script compile_myproject.sh to your Linux i386 machine
and run the script.
Another way is to make Nim invoke a cross compiler toolchain:

nim c --cpu:arm --os:linux myproject.nim

For cross compilation, the compiler invokes a C compiler named like $cpu.$os.$cc (for example a
rm.linux.gcc ) with options defined in $cpu.$os.$cc.options.always . The configuration system
is used to provide meaningful defaults. For example, for Linux on a 32-bit ARM CPU, your
configuration file should contain something like:

arm.linux.gcc.path = "/usr/bin"
arm.linux.gcc.exe = "arm-linux-gcc"
arm.linux.gcc.linkerexe = "arm-linux-gcc"
arm.linux.gcc.options.always = "-w -fmax-errors=3"

Cross-compilation for Windows

To cross-compile for Windows from Linux or macOS using the MinGW-w64 toolchain:

nim c -d:mingw myproject.nim

# `nim r` also works, running the binary via `wine` or `wine64`:
nim r -d:mingw --eval:'import os; echo "a" / "b"'

Use --cpu:i386 or --cpu:amd64 to switch the CPU architecture.

The MinGW-w64 toolchain can be installed as follows:

apt install mingw-w64 # Ubuntu

yum install mingw32-gcc
yum install mingw64-gcc # CentOS - requires EPEL
 brew install mingw-w64 # OSX

Cross-compilation for Android

There are two ways to compile for Android: terminal programs (Termux) and with the NDK
(Android Native Development Kit).
The first one is to treat Android as a simple Linux and use Termux to connect and run the Nim
compiler directly on android as if it was Linux. These programs are console-only programs that
can't be distributed in the Play Store.
Use regular nim c inside termux to make Android terminal programs.
Normal Android apps are written in Java, to use Nim inside an Android app you need a small Java
stub that calls out to a native library written in Nim using the NDK. You can also use native-activity
to have the Java stub be auto-generated for you.
Use nim c -c --cpu:arm --os:android -d:androidNDK --noMain:on to generate the C source
files you need to include in your Android Studio project. Add the generated C files to CMake build
script in your Android project. Then do the final compile with Android Studio which uses Gradle to
call CMake to compile the project.
Because Nim is part of a library it can't have its own C-style main() so you would need to define
your own android_main and init the Java environment, or use a library like SDL2 or GLFM to do it.
After the Android stuff is done, it's very important to call NimMain() in order to initialize Nim's
garbage collector and to run the top level statements of your program.

proc NimMain() {.importc.}

proc glfmMain*(display: ptr GLFMDisplay) {.exportc.} =
NimMain() # initialize garbage collector memory, types and stack

The name NimMain can be influenced via the --nimMainPrefix:prefix switch. Use --nimMainPr
efix:MyLib and the function to call is named MyLibNimMain .

Cross-compilation for iOS

To cross-compile for iOS you need to be on a macOS computer and use XCode. Normal languages
for iOS development are Swift and Objective C. Both of these use LLVM and can be compiled into
object files linked together with C, C++ or Objective C code produced by Nim.
Use nim c -c --os:ios --noMain:on to generate C files and include them in your XCode
project. Then you can use XCode to compile, link, package and sign everything.
Because Nim is part of a library it can't have its own C-style main() so you would need to define m
ain that calls autoreleasepool and UIApplicationMain to do it, or use a library like SDL2 or
GLFM. After the iOS setup is done, it's very important to call NimMain() to initialize Nim's garbage
collector and to run the top-level statements of your program.

proc NimMain() {.importc.}

proc glfmMain*(display: ptr GLFMDisplay) {.exportc.} =
NimMain() # initialize garbage collector memory, types and stack

Note: XCode's "make clean" gets confused about the generated nim.c files, so you need to clean
those files manually to do a clean build.
The name NimMain can be influenced via the --nimMainPrefix:prefix switch. Use --nimMainPr
efix:MyLib and the function to call is named MyLibNimMain .

Cross-compilation for Nintendo Switch

Simply add --os:nintendoswitch to your usual nim c or nim cpp command and set the passC
and passL command line switches to something like:

nim c ... --d:nimAllocPagesViaMalloc --mm:orc --passC="-I$DEVKITPRO/libnx/include"

--passL="-specs=$DEVKITPRO/libnx/switch.specs -L$DEVKITPRO/libnx/lib -lnx"

or setup a nim.cfg file like so:

#nim.cfg
--mm:orc
--d:nimAllocPagesViaMalloc
--define:nimInheritHandles
--passC="-I$DEVKITPRO/libnx/include"
--passL="-specs=$DEVKITPRO/libnx/switch.specs -L$DEVKITPRO/libnx/lib -lnx"

The devkitPro setup must be the same as the default with their new installer here for Mac/Linux or
here for Windows.
For example, with the above-mentioned config:

nim c --os:nintendoswitch switchhomebrew.nim

This will generate a file called switchhomebrew.elf which can then be turned into an nro file with
the elf2nro tool in the devkitPro release. Examples can be found at the nim-libnx github repo.
There are a few things that don't work because the devkitPro libraries don't support them. They
are:
1. Waiting for a subprocess to finish. A subprocess can be started, but right now it can't be waited
 on, which sort of makes subprocesses a bit hard to use
2. Dynamic calls. Switch OS (Horizon) doesn't support dynamic libraries, so dlopen/dlclose are not
available.
3. mqueue. Sadly there are no mqueue headers.
4. ucontext. No headers for these either. No coroutines for now :(
5. nl_types. No headers for this.
6. As mmap is not supported, the nimAllocPagesViaMalloc option has to be used.

GPU Compilation

Compiling for GPU computation can be achieved with --cc:nvcc for CUDA with nvcc, or with --c
c:hipcc for AMD GPUs with HIP. Both compilers require building for C++ with nim cpp .
Here's a very simple CUDA kernel example using emit, which can be compiled with nim cpp --cc:
nvcc --define:"useMalloc" hello_kernel.nim assuming you have the CUDA toolkit installed.

{.emit: """
__global__ void add(int a, int b) {
int c;
c = a + b;
}
""".}

proc main() =
{.emit: """
add<<<1,1>>>(2,7);
""".}

main()

DLL generation

Note: The same rules apply to lib*.so shared object files on UNIX. For better readability only the
DLL version is described here.
Nim supports the generation of DLLs. However, there must be only one instance of the GC per
process/address space. This instance is contained in nimrtl.dll . This means that every generated
Nim DLL depends on nimrtl.dll . To generate the "nimrtl.dll" file, use the command:

nim c -d:release lib/nimrtl.nim

To link against nimrtl.dll use the command:

nim c -d:useNimRtl myprog.nim

Additional compilation switches

The standard library supports a growing number of useX conditional defines affecting how some
features are implemented. This section tries to give a complete list.
Define Effect
Turns on the optimizer. More aggressive optimizations are possible, e.g.: --passC:-ffast-ma
release
th (but see issue #10305)
danger Turns off all runtime checks and turns on the optimizer.
useFork Makes osproc use fork instead of posix_spawn .
useNimRt
l Compile and link against nimrtl.dll .
Makes Nim use C's malloc instead of Nim's own memory manager, albeit prefixing each
useMallo
c allocation with its size to support clearing memory on reallocation. This only works with --m
m:none , --mm:arc and --mm:orc .
useRealt Enables support of Nim's GC for soft realtime systems. See the documentation of the refc for
imeGC further information.
logGC Enable GC logging to stdout.
nodejs The JS target is actually node.js .
ssl Enables OpenSSL support for the sockets module.
memProfi
ler Enables memory profiling for the native GC.
uClibc Use uClibc instead of libc. (Relevant for Unix-like OSes)
When using types from C headers, add checks that compare what's in the Nim file with what's
checkAbi
in the C header. This may become enabled by default in the future.
This symbol takes a string as its value, like --define:tempDir:/some/temp/path to override
tempDir the temporary directory returned by os.getTempDir() . The value should end with a
directory separator character. (Relevant for the Android platform)
This symbol takes a string as its value, like --define:useShPath:/opt/sh/bin/sh to
useShPat
h override the path for the sh binary, in cases where it is not located in the default location /b
in/sh .
noSignal
Handler Disable the crash handler from system.nim .
globalSy Load all {.dynlib.} libraries with the RTLD_GLOBAL flag on Posix systems to resolve
mbols symbols in subsequently loaded libraries.
lto Enable link-time optimization in the backend compiler and linker.
lto_incr Enable link-time optimization and additionally enable incremental linking for compilers that
emental support it. Currently only clang and vcc.
strip Strip debug symbols added by the backend compiler from the executable.
Additional Features

This section describes Nim's additional features that are not listed in the Nim manual. Some of the
features here only make sense for the C code generator and are subject to change.

LineDir option
The --lineDir option can be turned on or off. If turned on the generated C code contains #line
directives. This may be helpful for debugging with GDB.

StackTrace option
If the --stackTrace option is turned on, the generated C contains code to ensure that proper
stack traces are given if the program crashes or some uncaught exception is raised.

LineTrace option
The --lineTrace option implies the stackTrace option. If turned on, the generated C contains
code to ensure that proper stack traces with line number information are given if the program
crashes or an uncaught exception is raised.

DynlibOverride

By default Nim's dynlib pragma causes the compiler to generate GetProcAddress (or their Unix
counterparts) calls to bind to a DLL. With the dynlibOverride command line switch this can be
prevented and then via --passL the static library can be linked against. For instance, to link
statically against Lua this command might work on Linux:

nim c --dynlibOverride:lua --passL:liblua.lib program.nim

Backend language options

The typical compiler usage involves using the compile or c command to transform a .nim file
into one or more .c files which are then compiled with the platform's C compiler into a static
binary. However, there are other commands to compile to C++, Objective-C, or JavaScript. More
details can be read in the Nim Backend Integration document.

Nim documentation tools

Nim provides the doc command to generate HTML documentation from .nim source files. Only
exported symbols will appear in the output. For more details see the docgen documentation.

Nim idetools integration

Nim provides language integration with external IDEs through the idetools command. See the
documentation of idetools for further information.

Nim for embedded systems

While the default Nim configuration is targeted for optimal performance on modern PC hardware
and operating systems with ample memory, it is very well possible to run Nim code and a good part
of the Nim standard libraries on small embedded microprocessors with only a few kilobytes of
memory.
A good start is to use the any operating target together with the malloc memory allocator and
the arc garbage collector. For example:

nim c --os:any --mm:arc -d:useMalloc [...] x.nim

--mm:arc will enable the reference counting memory management instead of the default
garbage collector. This enables Nim to use heap memory which is required for strings and seqs,
for example.
The --os:any target makes sure Nim does not depend on any specific operating system
primitives. Your platform should support only some basic ANSI C library stdlib and stdio
functions which should be available on almost any platform.
The -d:useMalloc option configures Nim to use only the standard C memory manage
primitives malloc() , free() , realloc() .
If your platform does not provide these functions it should be trivial to provide an implementation
for them and link these to your program.
For targets with very restricted memory, it might be beneficial to pass some additional flags to
both the Nim compiler and the C compiler and/or linker to optimize the build for size. For example,
the following flags can be used when targeting a gcc compiler:
--opt:size -d:lto -d:strip
The --opt:size flag instructs Nim to optimize code generation for small size (with the help of the
C compiler), the -d:lto flags enable link-time optimization in the compiler and linker, the -d:stri
p strips debug symbols.
Check the Cross-compilation section for instructions on how to compile the program for your
target.

nimAllocPagesViaMalloc
Nim's default allocator is based on TLSF, this algorithm was designed for embedded devices. This
allocator gets blocks/pages of memory via a currently undocumented osalloc API which usually
uses POSIX's mmap call. On many environments mmap is not available but C's malloc is. You can
use the nimAllocPagesViaMalloc define to use malloc instead of mmap . nimAllocPagesViaMall
oc is currently only supported with --mm:arc or --mm:orc . (Since version 1.6)

nimPage256 / nimPage512 / nimPage1k

Adjust the page size for Nim's GC allocator. This enables using nimAllocPagesViaMalloc on
devices with less RAM. The default page size requires too much RAM to work.
Recommended settings:
< 32 kB of RAM use nimPage256
< 512 kB of RAM use nimPage512
< 2 MB of RAM use nimPage1k

Initial testing hasn't shown much difference between 512B or 1kB page sizes in terms of
performance or latency. Using nimPages256 will limit the total amount of allocatable RAM.

nimMemAlignTiny

Sets MemAlign to 4 bytes which reduces the memory alignment to better match some embedded
devices.

Thread stack size

Nim's thread API provides a simple wrapper around more advanced RTOS task features.
Customizing the stack size and stack guard size can be done by setting -d:nimThreadStackSize=1
6384 or -d:nimThreadStackGuard=32 .
Currently only Zephyr, NuttX and FreeRTOS support these configurations.

Nim for realtime systems

See the --mm:arc or --mm:orc memory management settings in MM for further information.

Signal handling in Nim

The Nim programming language has no concept of Posix's signal handling mechanisms. However,
the standard library offers some rudimentary support for signal handling, in particular,
segmentation faults are turned into fatal errors that produce a stack trace. This can be disabled
with the -d:noSignalHandler switch.

Optimizing for Nim

Nim has no separate optimizer, but the C code that is produced is very efficient. Most C compilers
have excellent optimizers, so usually it is not needed to optimize one's code. Nim has been
designed to encourage efficient code: The most readable code in Nim is often the most efficient
too.
However, sometimes one has to optimize. Do it in the following order:
1. switch off the embedded debugger (it is slow!)
2. turn on the optimizer and turn off runtime checks
3. profile your code to find where the bottlenecks are
4. try to find a better algorithm
5. do low-level optimizations

This section can only help you with the last item.

Optimizing string handling

String assignments are sometimes expensive in Nim: They are required to copy the whole string.
However, the compiler is often smart enough to not copy strings. Due to the argument passing
semantics, strings are never copied when passed to subroutines. The compiler does not copy
strings that are a result of a procedure call, because the callee returns a new string anyway. Thus it
is efficient to do:

var s = procA() # assignment will not copy the string; procA allocates a new
# string already

However, it is not efficient to do:

var s = varA # assignment has to copy the whole string into a new buffer!

For let symbols a copy is not always necessary:

let s = varA # may only copy a pointer if it safe to do so

The compiler optimizes string case statements: A hashing scheme is used for them if several
different string constants are used. So code like this is reasonably efficient:

case normalize(k.key)
of "name": c.name = v
of "displayname": c.displayName = v
of "version": c.version = v
of "os": c.oses = split(v, {';'})
of "cpu": c.cpus = split(v, {';'})
of "authors": c.authors = split(v, {';'})
of "description": c.description = v
of "app":
case normalize(v)
of "console": c.app = appConsole
of "gui": c.app = appGUI
else: quit(errorStr(p, "expected: console or gui"))
of "license": c.license = UnixToNativePath(k.value)
else: quit(errorStr(p, "unknown variable: " & k.key))

Made with Nim. Generated: 2025-07-23 22:00:43 UTC