Getting started › Install

Install

Grab a prebuilt release from GitHub and run --setup once, or build the compiler from source — it's a single Go module plus a small C++ runtime.

From a release

  1. Download the archive for your platform from the releases page and extract it.
  2. Run hover --setup once, with network access. It does three things: finds a usable Zig toolchain (on Windows it downloads one into ./toolchain/zig; on Linux it expects one on PATH), builds the C++ runtime from the shipped sources, and downloads the standard library into ~/.hover. Releases deliberately do not bundle the standard library, so until this runs, no import <math> resolves. See CLI reference.

Re-run it any time a compile fails with a "Zig not found" error, or to pick up a standard-library patch release.

From source

Building from source needs:

  • Go, to build the hover CLI itself.
  • Zig — no separate C++ toolchain needed. Every generated sim.cpp is compiled with zig c++, and the runtime library (which links against the bundled Eigen headers for its MNA solver) is built the same way. See Build targets.

This produces the hover binary. From a source tree, angle-bracket imports resolve against the bundled stdlib/ directory next to the binary, so no download is needed — but the runtime library is still built by hover --setup, so run it once before the first compile. See the repository README for target-specific flags and make linux / make windows for packaging a standalone release.

Hoverdeck GUI

If you prefer a graphical interface, Hoverdeck is a desktop app that wraps the Hover CLI. Download the single binary for your platform from the releases page and run it — no installation step required.

  1. Download the binary for your platform from the Hoverdeck releases page.
  2. Launch it and open Settings from the top-right corner.
  3. Point it at the directory where hover is installed. Once the CLI path is set, the GUI is ready to use — you can create, edit, and simulate circuits without touching the command line.

Hoverdeck drives the same hover binary underneath, so make sure the CLI is installed and set up with hover --setup first.

Verify

Run it against any example under examples/ in the repository — see Example circuits — or jump straight to Your first circuit.

← Introduction Your first circuit →