Installation

Getting started with BoxLang is easy! Choose your path wisely!

PLEASE NOTE THAT WE ARE STILL IN OPEN BETA. ANYTHING CAN CHANGE

Requirements

You should be able to grab the Java 21 JDK for your OS and CPU arch here: Download Java 21 JDK 4

JDK 21+

BoxLang is currently compiling Java source on the fly for debugging purposes, so it requires a JDK, not a JRE, to run! Once we go stable, JRE will be the requirement.

We recommend using homebrew to get started on a Mac with the BoxLang requirements. If not, you must download the requirements separately from the link above.

brew install curl zip unzip openjdk@21

Leverage your system‘s package manager to install the needed requirements.

APT

# Update OS first
sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get full-upgrade

# Install requirements
sudo apt-get install curl zip unzip openjdk-21

Yum

# Update OS first
sudo yum update
sudo yum upgrade

# Install requirements
sudo yum install curl zip unzip java-21-openjdk

Powershell Script

# Set the JDK version and download URL
$jdkVersion = "21"
# UPDATE AS NEEDED
$jdkUrl = "https://download.java.net/java/GA/jdk21.0.2/f2283984656d49d69e91c558476027ac/13/GPL/openjdk-21.0.2_windows-x64_bin.zip"
$installPath = "C:\Program Files\Java\jdk$jdkVersion"

# Download the JDK zip file
Write-Host "Downloading OpenJDK $jdkVersion..."
Invoke-WebRequest -Uri $jdkUrl -OutFile "$env:TEMP\openjdk-$jdkVersion.zip"

# Create the installation directory if it doesn't exist
if (-Not (Test-Path -Path $installPath)) {
    New-Item -ItemType Directory -Path $installPath
}

# Extract the downloaded zip file to the installation path
Write-Host "Extracting OpenJDK $jdkVersion..."
Expand-Archive -Path "$env:TEMP\openjdk-$jdkVersion.zip" -DestinationPath $installPath

# Set the JAVA_HOME environment variable
Write-Host "Setting JAVA_HOME..."
[System.Environment]::SetEnvironmentVariable("JAVA_HOME", $installPath, [System.EnvironmentVariableTarget]::Machine)

# Update the PATH environment variable
$path = [System.Environment]::GetEnvironmentVariable("Path", [System.EnvironmentVariableTarget]::Machine)
if ($path -notlike "*$installPath\bin*") {
    Write-Host "Updating PATH..."
    $newPath = "$installPath\bin;$path"
    [System.Environment]::SetEnvironmentVariable("Path", $newPath, [System.EnvironmentVariableTarget]::Machine)
}

Write-Host "OpenJDK $jdkVersion installation completed."

Quick Installer

To get started quickly with BoxLang, use our BoxLang Quick Installer for Mac/Linux/*Nix/Windows

/bin/bash -c "$(curl -fsSL https://downloads.ortussolutions.com/ortussolutions/boxlang/install-boxlang.sh)"

/bin/sh -c "$(curl -fsSL https://downloads.ortussolutions.com/ortussolutions/boxlang/install-boxlang.sh)"

iex ((New-Object System.Net.WebClient).DownloadString('https://raw.githubusercontent.com/ortus-boxlang/boxlang-quick-installer/main/src/Run-InstallBoxLang.ps1'))

If your system requires admin privileges (Like Chromebooks), make sure you use sudo or make sure the /usr/local folder is yours as the owner.

The quick installer requires the following:

JDK21+
Permission to copy files to /usr/local/bin and /usr/local/lib

The quick installer will install the OS binary and the MiniServer in the above directories. It will also install the following scripts for you.

boxlang - Our BoxLang binary runner, learn more
boxlang-miniserver - Our BoxLang MiniServer binary runner, learn more
install-boxlang - The quick installer so you can reuse it to upgrade your installations
install-bx-module - A module installer. Just pass in the slug of the module and watch it install
install-bx-modules - A way to install multiple modules asynchronously. Just pass a space delimited list

# Install a single module
install-bx-module bx-compat-cfml

# Install multiple async modules
install-bx-modules bx-compat-cfml bx-esapi bx-pdf

Upgrading Your Install

The install-boxlang script will allow you to easily upgrade your OS install as well. If you call it with no arguments, then it will install the latest release and override the local install. You can also pass a specific version to install as the second argument.

# Install / Upgrade to the latest version
install-boxlang

# Upgrade or Downgrade to a specific version
install-boxlang 1.0.0

# Use the latest snapshot
install-boxlang snapshot

You can get the version of the current BoxLang Runtime by running boxlang --version

REPL

Just run boxlang and you are ready to rock in our REPL:

Installing Modules

You can use the install-bx-module binary to install modules into your boxlang home. Just pass in the name of the slug you want. All of our core modules are available here and in FORGEBOX. Please note that you can only install our core modules from this binary, not any module from FORGEBOX, for that, use CommandBox.

install-bx-module bx-compat-cfml
install-bx-module bx-esapi

Binaries

The quick installer is the best and easiest way to get installed on Mac or *Nix. However, below, you can find a collection of all our installers and binaries for running BoxLang and each Runtime.

Please note that the binaries here are the latest beta builds, not the bleeding edge builds.

Operating System Binaries

Here, you can find the installers and binaries for all Operating Systems:

Windows Installer: https://downloads.ortussolutions.com/ortussolutions/boxlang/boxlang-installer.exe
Zip (All OSs): https://downloads.ortussolutions.com/ortussolutions/boxlang/boxlang-latest.zip
Jar: https://downloads.ortussolutions.com/ortussolutions/boxlang/boxlang-latest-all.jar
Quick Installer (Mac/*nix) https://downloads.ortussolutions.com/ortussolutions/boxlang/install-boxlang.sh

MiniServer Binaries

The BoxLang MiniServer includes the BoxLang OS runtime with the addition of our super fast and lightweight web server.

All OSs: https://downloads.ortussolutions.com/ortussolutions/boxlang-runtimes/boxlang-miniserver/boxlang-miniserver-latest.zip

AWS Lambda Binaries

BoxLang can also run on AWS Lambdas. It even powers our entry playground at https://try.boxlang.io.

CommandBox BoxLang Server

BoxLang can also be deployed using CommandBox. This is our preferred way to deploy web applications using BoxLang. BoxLang +/++ Subscribers even get access to CommandBox Pro.

box install commandbox-boxlang
box server start cfengine=boxlang javaVersion=openjdk21_jdk

Learn more in our CommandBox guide.

Servlet EE Binaries

This is the servlet edition of BoxLang that you can deploy on any servlet container (Jetty, Tomcat, JBoss, etc)

Docker

We have a full Docker guide you can follow here.

BoxLang IDE

The BoxLang IDE is a collection of modules for VSCode. You can find it here:

Core Modules

The BoxLang core is lightweight and fast. Everything that extends the core comes in the form of modules. We have a collection of core modules that the BoxLang team maintains and curates. We also have several enterprise modules for our BoxLang +,++ subscribers and the community also can create and share modules in our cloud package manager FORGEBOX.

We recommend you use CommandBox, Our CLI and Package Manager, to interact, install, and work with any package in BoxLang.

Modules

BoxLang+, ++ Modules

Our BoxLang+, and ++ subscribers not only get customized support but also new features, and modules. You can find out more about our subscriptions here: https://boxlang.io/plans. Here is the collection of modules that you will get with your subscription.

Module

Description

Status

Please note that these modules are still under development; we will publish their status as we complete them.

PreviousFrequently Asked Questions NextModules

Last updated 28 days ago