[northstar] Stage 1 — dataflow projection: body-level dataflow reading of the AST #37

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2026-05-29T17:44:21+02:00

Brummel commented

2026-05-29 17:44:21 +02:00

Stage 1 of the visual-dataflow-authoring north star (see milestone).

Capability. Every .ail body projects deterministically onto a dataflow graph: let / app / match / effects become nodes and edges, and the function/scope hierarchy becomes the adjustable abstraction height (a function is a black box; opening it shows its body as a sub-graph; entering it makes that scope the root).

Why this is the first stone. It needs only the existing AST, not a larger language — the only stage that can begin against today's code. It is the hashable, snapshot-testable half that belongs in the repo next to prose / render / deps.

Build on, don't duplicate. ail deps already extracts the def-level edge half (crates/ail/src/main.rs, via collect_refs / walk_term). The genuinely new part is the intra-body dataflow reading.

depends on: (none — buildable against today's AST)
context: north-star stage; not yet decision-ready as a spec

Stage 1 of the **visual-dataflow-authoring** north star (see milestone). **Capability.** Every `.ail` body projects deterministically onto a dataflow graph: `let` / `app` / `match` / effects become nodes and edges, and the function/scope hierarchy becomes the adjustable abstraction height (a function is a black box; opening it shows its body as a sub-graph; entering it makes that scope the root). **Why this is the first stone.** It needs only the existing AST, not a larger language — the only stage that can begin against today's code. It is the hashable, snapshot-testable half that belongs in the repo next to `prose` / `render` / `deps`. **Build on, don't duplicate.** `ail deps` already extracts the def-level edge half (crates/ail/src/main.rs, via collect_refs / walk_term). The genuinely new part is the *intra-body* dataflow reading. depends on: (none — buildable against today's AST) context: north-star stage; not yet decision-ready as a spec

Brummel added this to the visual-dataflow-authoring milestone 2026-05-29 17:44:21 +02:00

Brummel added the idea label 2026-05-29 17:44:21 +02:00

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Reference: Brummel/AILang#37