That strikes me as kind of an object oriented/functional markup language more than a programming language for some reason.

One question I have is why "Give <n>" rather than the standard "Return"?

Glad to see some more progress on this Ashbad.

Thsi looks liek it could be very useful for some things, but I'd like a good explanation of the syntax

That you shall get in the future, once I get further on the documentation I'm laboring on

however, I used 'give' because I pretty much like it that way.  You see, in a function, you can 'take' an argument, which means basically you absorb the argument into a local variable in objects, such as:

type cat
  string:char name <to nil
  method new(name)
    take @name
  enddef
enddef

well, it would need the argument to be taken, because otherwise there would be nothing to absorb

okay, I'll try me best to explain

basically, a local variable that is accessed within methods starts with @, showing it's a instance-only variable (@@ means type variable, and @@@ means group variable).  When you 'take' an argument, you're doing basically this:

self.variable = new_variable
except, it would just "take" it instead:

take @variable
The two are exactly the same in function, though take can be used in other applications as well, such as in this:

method change_attribute_for_group(attribute)
  take @@@attribute
enddef
which is highly useful for quickly changing a framework for an instance group.

yeah, it's pretty much like that

Well the syntax is a bit of Rubonic Pike mixed with my own verbose ideals.  It's a bit different than many other languages, but to say one thing, its extremely flexible and awesome, as you can do things like non-linear expressions, polytyping variables to fit certain criteria, and such.  Comparison of C code and Verdant code:

typedef union {
  Int val1;
  Float val2;
} int_float;

Int_float apple = 2.0f;
apple += 5;
apple *= 2;
int:float apple <to (2 * (parseval + 5) to> parseval)
It's not a great example, but it shows non-linear assignment and the use of parseval (a variable local to each line of complete code, basically holds currently parsed value)

Keep in mind, the C code I just posted would most likely not be far off from what would be executed if the Verdant code above was compiled and then run.

Also keep in mind that Verdant code I posted isn't very optimized at all, and would be better written as this:

int:float apple <to 2 * (parseval +5)
But that totally ruins my example