Embeddable VM runtime for ANSI C

Question

I'm looking for a Virtual Machine runtime environment that is embeddable in any ANSI C code.

I have designed a syntax for a functional language that looks a lot like a stripped version of CoffeeScript. Now I want to write a compiler for this language, but I don't have know what VM I should go for.

The key function for my language is support for closures and of course a sane GC. It should be fairly small.

I have been working with Lua in a couple of projects and I'm investigating the Lua 5.1 VM. However, it seems to be tightly coupled with Luas concept of tables which my language wouldn't utilize.

Any suggestions?

Answer 1

Have you looked at Parrot?

http://www.parrot.org/

Answer 2

There's also the Neko VM.

Answer 3

Another option might be TinyVM which is very small, and it's codebase is surprisingly clean. The original project also has a forked branch that improves on performance: FastVM. Both are pretty powerful for their size, and could easily be extended to best fit your needs.

Hope this helps! :)

Answer 4

Besides many other alternatives, have a look at the squirrel progamming language and its VM.