diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 418443c..91086fb 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -1,30 +1,20 @@
-# hl
-General purpose highlighter.
+# libhl
- // it would be lovely to have a different name the "library" part and the cli
+## API
+ int hl_init(void);
+ int hl_deinit(void);
+These functions are responsible for the library's "life time".
+`hl_init()` must be called before any other library function.
+`hl_deinit()` will ensure all occupied memory is freed.
-# Usage
-hl will read from stdin and write to stdout.
- hl < source/main.c
-
-### Cli Options
- -h : display help message
- -F
: syntax file look up directory
- -s : specify syntax to load
-
-### Environment variables
- HL_HOME : default directory to load syntax files from
-
-# API
void render_string(const char * const string, const char * const mode);
-This function matches _string_ against all known highlighting rules and dispatches the appropriate callback defending on mode.
+This function matches _string_ against all known highlighting rules and dispatches the appropriate callback depending on _mode_.
typedef void (*attribute_callback_t)(const char * const string, const int length, void * const attributes);
The type used for defining appropriate callbacks for render_string().
- string - string to be outputed
- length - number of characters that matched a highlighting rule;
- 0 if rule passed, in such a case the user is expected still want 1 character outputed
- attributes - arbitrary data associated with the matched rule; intended to hold color/font information for example
++ string - string to be outputed
++ length - number of characters that matched a highlighting rule
++ attributes - arbitrary data associated with the matched rule; intended to hold color/font information for example
typedef struct {
char * key;
@@ -43,30 +33,49 @@ This is how you append a display mode that render_string() will search based on
} token_type_t;
These are the valid type of distinct token types.
- KEYSYMBOL - a string which is contextless, the surounding text is ignored
- "mysymbol" will match inside all of these:
- "something mysymbol something"
- "somethingmysymbolsomething"
- it is intended to match such thing as programming language operators,
- so both "var a = 'a'" and "var a='a'" are recognized
- KEYWORD - a string which is recognized when surounded by word bundaries such as ' ' or '\t'
- MATCH - a Vim style regular expression to be recognized
- REGION - a Vim style regular expression where the starting and ending patters are to be distinguished from the contents
++ KEYSYMBOL - a string which is contextless, the surounding text is ignored
+ "mysymbol" will match inside all of these:
+ "something mysymbol something"
+ "somethingmysymbolsomething"
+ it is intended to match such thing as programming language operators
++ KEYWORD - a string which is recognized when surounded by word bundaries such as ' ' or '\t'
++ MATCH - a regular expression to be recognized
++ REGION - a regular expression where the starting and ending patters are to be distinguished from the contents
The universal way to add a new pattern to be recognized is with:
token * new_token(const char * const syntax, const token_type_t t, const hl_group_t * const g);
-This wraps one of the following:
-
- // ?!
-
There are also convinience functions:
// NOTE: the return value is the number tokens successfully inserted
- int new_keyword_tokens(const char * const * words, hl_group_t * const g);
+ int new_keyword_tokens(const char * const * words, hl_group_t * const g); // _words_ must be NULL terminated
int new_syntax_character_tokens(const char * const chars, hl_group_t * const g);
+The regex engine used for MATCHes is Jeger by default, emulating Vim regex.
+However the regex engine can be overridden:
+
+ // ?!
+
+---
+
+#hl
+General purpose highlighter (and demo program for libhl).
+
+## Usage
+hl will read from stdin and write to stdout.
+ hl < source/main.c
+
+### Cli Options
+ -h : display help message
+ -F : syntax file look up directory
+ -s : specify syntax to load
+
+### Environment variables
+ HL_HOME : default directory to load syntax files from
+
+---
+
# Scripting
hl can parse a small subset of VimScript: the few instructions related to highlighing, and it ignores everything else.
All Vim highlighing scripts should be valid hl scripts.