1d20 Sci-Fi Programming Languages and Command Line Tools

15 Dec, 2024

1. Shish: Package manager. shish kabob to install, shish drop to uninstall. Loading bars use hyphens to look like a kebab being filled. Vulnerable to packages with similar names. Package Managers are the primary source of software in rimspace. With data transmission often being more easily measured in hours or days than milliseconds, webapps make little sense, and every X-Class Nobody or Salvage Ship Sweater can access a terminal, even if it costs a little scrip. The most popular packages are Caramel (for applying Gosh styling to your terminal), Double Dutch's Last Duel (A series of comedic-western freeware games) and CressCred (A black market hawala system)
2. Sphinx: Scripting language. Named because the creators claim anything can be achieved in three lines of code. This results in sprawling libraries of very specific commands and equally sprawling arguments of whether a codebase is "Sphynxian" or not. Vulnerable to simple, well known exploits in any of the thousands of poorly maintained libraries the average script might interface with.
3. F: The definitive space-age programming language. F, syntactically, is based on the earth-age language C but took prominence due to the tougher demands of the space age. Better dynamic memory management and efficient self-checking of compiled code made F the language of choice for a world where most computer systems are making life-or-death decisions and error tolerance must be high. Though rarer than C's, F is still vulnerable to show stopping buffer overruns. Thousands of deaths a year can be attributed to complacency in ostensibly space worthy architecture around these low level issues.
4. Declarative F: A superset of F. Came into its own as one of the first high level AI programming languages. So called because the user builds a set of rules for possible operations, and the compiler autonomously calculates the optimal sequence of legal operations to achieve the required state. Later superceded by Inductive F. Vulnerable to circular logic causing memory overflows and unpredictable behaviour.
5. F-Star:An object oriented language that compiles down to F. Most modern tech stacks rely on F Star. Vulnerable to hardware not supporting compiled functions, which can be quite dangerous if the hardware is, for example, a star ship with 50 crew attempting to parse the boot code for a newly installed life support module.
6. Ludo: Originally designed for game pathfinding, this F library came into its own for accurate simulation of the logistical supersystems that started spreading across the galaxy. Vulnerable to cascading mistakes from rounding errors, inaccurate data or inconsistencies.
7. Lockstep: Orchestration software used to remotely manage large numbers of machines simultaneously. Vulnerable to the 'King' machine being compromised, therefore exposing all 'Serf' machines to malicious control. The last 90 years have seen many developers attempting to build alternatives to the old "Vassal" model for large scale Lockstep orchestrations - where long chains of king-serf relationships lead to so called "God" Machines orchestrating galaxy wide programs. Single points of vulnerability that could fire off commands on any and all machines in their extended web of control.
8. Goose: Testing framework for any language that can compile down to F. Named after the game Duck Duck Goose. Started a trend at conventions for testers wearing goose hats. Vulnerable to poorly written tests and developer complacency.GooseFAT (Faux Actor Testing) is a popular extension that can mock up ship systems (electronic, legal or process based) and can even provide renders. Variations of GooseFAT are used in several ship models to provide up to date danger modelling in emergencies, with helpful (if terrifying) estimates for chance of survival.
9. Ludite: State of the art human level AI framework based on Ludo. Simulates a developed biological (and, importantly, analogue) brain on integrated circuitry. It is nearly impossible to decode the emulated mind as the current "state of mind" is spread over trillions of nodes, but localised clusters can be analysed and have their activity plotted. Vulnerable to baseline shifts, where rounding errors cause the emulated mind to stray further and further from sensible baselines without regular "Death Flushes".
10. Mogul: Popular terminal scripting language. Notorious for Mogolf - where programmers challenge each other to fit scripts in as few key presses as possible. "d*f" will wipe the harddrive. Vulnerable to people running commands they don't understand. With these commands being obtuse at best, attackers have been known to disguise malicious script as seemingly innocent text, from poems to ASCII drawings.
11. Djinn: A now banned AI framework that its developers proposed would make obsolete all programming by compiling any command down to code. Even self-training or commissioning humans to be able to develop specialised sections. Two years later, the project was shut down, the development team disappeared and The Company deny the project ever existed. Some claim its success led to the developers ascending from our reality. Others claim it was deemed an existential threat in its infancy and promptly destroyed, its developers terminated.
12. PUML: Presentation Undifferentiated Markup Language. Lays out interfaces with purpose oriented definitions so they are renderable on everything from 3D holograms to two colour text only displays. Vulnerable to new issues introduced by the raft of compatibility patches introduced each week.
13. Lug: Version management software. Vulnerable to confidential information being unremovable from the code history. Lug logs are permanent, uneditable and unrestricted. This has led to them becoming the de facto Public Square (or perhaps more accurately Bathroom Stall Wall) for developers to communicate asynchronously across decades or centuries. Standard practice for this is to leave a comment and delete it in the same change bundle.
14. Gosh: A popular style definition language for PUML. Renowned for Gosh Bashing - the ability for end users to dramatically customise and overhaul PUML layers of their software with little programming experience. Vulnerable to falling out of sync with PUML. There are also routes by which malicious code could theoretically be executed, but they are too obtuse to be practical to a malicious actor. These attacks often involve loading an interface on strange hardware to send unexpected trigger patterns or loading an interface into an environment with a high degree of user agency (e.g. Virtual Reality)
15. Lush: Apocryphally standing for Launch Ur Shit, Lush is a framework for automatically managing the deluge of signals, maneuvers and steps needed to clear takeoff of a space vessel. Vulnerable to Yes-Man Attacks, where an attacker spams ships with launch signals to trigger launch behaviour out of sequence or at inappropriate times.
16. FOX: F On Xenocircuitry. Experimental library for running F on any system that can input and output electronic signals. Bridge components are often needed for more unusual interfaces. FOX handles encoding and decoding everything from hexadecimal to Aramaic off the shelf, with the ability to define highly flexible custom interfaces. Favoured by Xenotechnologists to pry into non-human devices. Theoretically vulnerable to attacks originating from the exotic hardware it interfaces with, but none of these so called "Xero Day Vulnerabilties" have ever been encountered.
17. Pirouette: Orchestration app commonly used to rouse ships from quiet running and crews from cryosleep due to its small footprint. Usually programmed with far too many conditions for rousing, making most crews fairly complacent about so-called "Night Calls".
18. Pon: Command for transferring binary data to anywhere in memory or storage. Has some legitimate uses and many more illegitimate ones. PonPonPon Attacks are a terrifying but unlikely threat. They see a malicious actor overwriting a memory address on an external interface as quickly as possible. If they can match or exceed the cycle speed of the target machine, they can lie to the machine in real time, making that interface appear to receive whatever input they want. But for that much effort you're pretty much always better off just overwriting the Debug Mode flag and controlling the interface manually.
19. UEH: Universal Error Handling. Diagnostics framework for ships. Defines an extensive set of error codes that all hardware is expected to use but few ever do. Usually hardware just throws a 505 "Error Found" code and nothing else.
20. Reel: Framework for handling Cast Bundles. Cast Bundling and The Cast Net expanded upon the earth age IP Protocol, adding three more protocol layers for distributing bundles of packets via either long distance lasers or even via physical packages sent on autonomous Cast Ships through hyperspace. Cast Bundling assumes the existence of numerous isolated internets, which receive large bundles of external data very infrequently. Bundles are normally kept for 20 years if their destination address is not recognised, to wait for the signals to define the address.

(Image by Kvistholt Photography)