Frontend Workflow

A frontend layer sits above the compiler pipeline. It is implemented in fol-frontend and shipped as the folc engine, which the fol manager dispatches to (see Toolchain Management).

The frontend owns:

• workflow commands: project/workspace setup, fetch and update flows, build/run/test/emit
• direct single-file compile dispatch
• root help and output rendering
• frontend diagnostics
• editor tooling dispatch under fol tool

Use this page as an entrypoint pointer; the detailed reference lives in the Tooling section:

• Tooling
• Frontend Workflow
• Tool Commands

Current Boundary

The current frontend milestone is about local workflows and the first backend.

It already covers:

• project and workspace scaffolding
• documented build.fol package entry files for new projects
• root discovery
• package preparation through fol-package
• git-backed dependency fetching and materialization
• fol.lock writing, locked fetches, offline warm-cache fetches, and update flows
• workspace dependency/status reporting
• build/run/test orchestration for shipped V1, the bounded V2 subset, and the shipped V3 surfaces
• routed workspace build/run/test/check entry through build.fol
• emitted Rust and lowered IR output
• editor-tooling entrypoints for parse, highlight, symbols, and LSP startup
• shell completions
• safe cleanup of build/cache/git/package-store roots
• frontend-owned direct compile routing

Future work is still expected around:

• richer package-store policy beyond the current read/write chains
• lockfile/version solving beyond the current pinned git contract
• additional backend targets