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Our Mascot's name is 8 Ball, he is a Pug!
Prog8: A Retro Language Project
Back in 2020, Irmen de Jong shared the story behind his Prog8 programming language. He began the project a few years earlier as a way to learn how to create a real compiler after previously writing several interpreters.
Prog8 started in Python but soon moved to Kotlin for maintainability. Since Irmen is a fan of retro computing—especially the Commodore 64—he targeted that platform first. The language is C-like with Python-inspired features, designed to let programmers write medium/high-level code while still providing direct hardware access and inline assembly.
By 2020, he had also added Commander X16 support. Although he had created a number of example programs, most of his time was still devoted to working on the compiler itself, fixing bugs, and adding features. His hope was that others would begin to use Prog8 for larger retro projects.
Summary of a post originally shared by Irmen de Jong in 2020
In 2025, just in time for VCFMW, an unremarkable trio of Gen X'ers who call themselves the Retrodores created the P8UG - Prog8 Users as a fun way to learn Prog 8 for making their C64s, C128s, X16s, and OtterXs do cool things.
Anyone can claim membership in P8UG if they like Prog 8 and want to work in productive way with others who also like Prog 8.
