Expressions

Every operator in Tact forms an expression, but there's much more to uncover as Tact offers a wide range of expressive options to choose from.

Literals

Literals represent values in Tact. These are fixed values—not variables—that you literally provide in your code. All literals in Tact are expressions themselves.

You can also call extension functions defined on certain primitive types corresponding to literals right on the literal values:

// Calling toString() defined for Int on a integer literal:
42.toString();
 
// Calling asComment() defined for String on a string literal:
"Tact is awesome!".asComment();

Integer literals

Integer literals can be written in decimal (base $10$), hexadecimal (base $16$), octal (base $8$) and binary (base $2$) notations:

• A decimal integer literal is a sequence of digits ($\mathrm{0 - 9}$).

• A leading $\mathrm{0x}$ (or $\mathrm{0X}$) indicates a hexadecimal integer literal. They can include digits ($\mathrm{0 - 9}$) and the letters $\mathrm{a - f}$ and $\mathrm{A - F}$. Note, that the case of a character does not change its value. Therefore: $\mathrm{0xa}$ = $\mathrm{0xA}$ = $10$ and $\mathrm{0xf}$ = $\mathrm{0xF}$ = $15$.

• A leading $\mathrm{0o}$ (or $\mathrm{0O}$) indicates a octal integer literals. They can include only the digits $\mathrm{0 - 7}$.

• A leading $\mathrm{0b}$ (or $\mathrm{0B}$) indicates a binary integer literal. THey can only include the digits $0$ and $1$.

Some examples of integer literals:

// decimal, base 10:
0, 42, 1_000, 020
 
// hexadecimal, base 16:
0xABC, 0xF, 0x0011
 
// octal, base 8:
0o777, 0o001
 
// binary, base 2:
0b01111001_01101111_01110101_00100000_01100001_01110010_01100101_00100000_01100001_01110111_01100101_01110011_01101111_01101101_01100101

Read more about integers and Int type on the dedicated page: Integers.

Boolean literals

The Bool type has only two literal values: true and false.

true == true;
true != false;

Read more about booleans and Bool type in the dedicated chapter: Booleans.

String literals

A string literal is zero or more characters enclosed in double (") quotation marks. All string literals are objects of String type.

"foo";
"1234";

Tact strings support a range of escape sequences (opens in a new tab) starting with a backslash \\ character:

• \\ — literal backslash
• \" — double quote
• \n — newline
• \r — carriage return
• \t — tab
• \v — vertical tab
• \b — backspace
• \f — form feed
• \x00 through \xFF — code point (opens in a new tab), must be exactly two hex digits long
• \u0000 through \uFFFF — Unicode code point (opens in a new tab), must be exactly four hex digits long
• \u{0} through \u{FFFFFF} — Unicode code point (opens in a new tab), can be from $1$ to $6$ hex digits long

// \\
"escape \\ if \\ you \\ can \\";
 
// \"
"this \"literally\" works";
 
// \n
"line \n another line";
 
// \r
"Shutters \r Like \r This \r One";
 
// \t
"spacing \t granted!";
 
// \v
"those \v words \v are \v aligned";
 
// \b
"rm\b\bcreate!";
 
// \f
"form \f feed";
 
// \x00 - \xFF
"this \x22literally\x22 works"; // \x22 represents a double quote
 
// \u0000 - \uFFFF
"danger, \u26A1 high voltage \u26A1"; // \u26A1 represents the ⚡ emoji
 
// \u{0} - \u{FFFFFF}
"\u{1F602} LOL \u{1F602}"; // \u{1F602} represents the 😂 emoji

null literal

The null value is written with a null literal. It's not an identifier and doesn't refer to any object. It's also not an instance of a primitive type. Instead, null represents a lack of identification and the intentional absence of any value.

let var: Int? = null; // variable, which can hold null value
var = 42;
if (var != null) {
    var!! + var!!;
}

Read more about working with null on the dedicated page: Optionals.

Identifiers

An identifier is a sequence of characters in the code that identifies a variable, constant, map and a function, as well as a Struct, Message, contract, trait, or their fields and methods. Identifiers are case-sensitive and not quoted.

In Tact, identifiers can contain latin lowercase letters (a-z), latin uppercase letters (A-Z), underscores (_) and digits ($\mathrm{0 - 9}$), but may not start with a digit. An identifier differs from a string in that a string is data, while an identifier is part of the code.

Note, that when identifiers for primitive types start with an uppercase letter. Used-defined composite types, such as Structs and Messages also must be capitalized.

Instantiation

You can create instances of the following types:

• Structs
• Messages

struct StExample {
    fieldInit: Int = 1;
    fieldUninit: Int;
}
 
fun example() {
    // Instance with default value of fieldInit
    StExample{ fieldUninit: 2 };
 
    // Instance with both fields set
    StExample{
        fieldInit: 0,
        fieldUninit: 2, // trailing comma is allowed
    };
}

Field access

You can directly access fields of the following types:

• Structs
• Messages

struct StExample {
    fieldInit: Int = 1;
    fieldUninit: Int;
}
 
fun example(): Int {
    let struct: StExample = StExample{ fieldUninit: 2 }; // instantiation
 
    struct.fieldInit;          // access a field
    return struct.fieldUninit; // return field value from the function
}

Extension function call

Extension functions are defined only on specific types. They can be called similar to method calls in many other languages:

42.toString(); // toString() is a stdlib function that is defined on Int type

Static function call

Anywhere in the function body, a global static function or an internal function of a contract can be called:

contract ExampleContract {
    receive() {
        now(); // now() is a static function of stdlib
        let expiration: Int = now() + 1000; // operation and variable declaration
        expiration = self.answerQuestion(); // internal function
    }
    fun answerQuestion(): Int {
        return 42;
    }
}

initOf

Expression initOf computes initial state (StateInit) of a contract:

//                     argument values for the init() function of the contract
//                     ↓   ↓
initOf ExampleContract(42, 100); // returns a Struct StateInit{}
//     ---------------
//     ↑
//     name of the contract
//     ↓
//     ---------------
initOf ExampleContract(
    42,  // first argument
    100, // second argument, trailing comma is allowed
);

Where StateInit is a built-in Struct, that consists of: