From Semantics to Computer Science


Book Description

Gilles Kahn was one of the most influential figures in the development of computer science and information technology, not only in Europe but throughout the world. This volume of articles by several leading computer scientists serves as a fitting memorial to Kahn's achievements and reflects the broad range of subjects to which he contributed through his scientific research and his work at INRIA, the French National Institute for Research in Computer Science and Control. The authors also reflect upon the future of computing: how it will develop as a subject in itself and how it will affect other disciplines, from biology and medical informatics, to web and networks in general. Its breadth of coverage, topicality, originality and depth of contribution, make this book a stimulating read for all those interested in the future development of information technology.




Semantics of Programming Languages


Book Description

Semantics of Programming Languages exposes the basic motivations and philosophy underlying the applications of semantic techniques in computer science. It introduces the mathematical theory of programming languages with an emphasis on higher-order functions and type systems. Designed as a text for upper-level and graduate-level students, the mathematically sophisticated approach will also prove useful to professionals who want an easily referenced description of fundamental results and calculi. Basic connections between computational behavior, denotational semantics, and the equational logic of functional programs are thoroughly and rigorously developed. Topics covered include models of types, operational semantics, category theory, domain theory, fixed point (denotational). semantics, full abstraction and other semantic correspondence criteria, types and evaluation, type checking and inference, parametric polymorphism, and subtyping. All topics are treated clearly and in depth, with complete proofs for the major results and numerous exercises.




The Formal Semantics of Programming Languages


Book Description

The Formal Semantics of Programming Languages provides the basic mathematical techniques necessary for those who are beginning a study of the semantics and logics of programming languages. These techniques will allow students to invent, formalize, and justify rules with which to reason about a variety of programming languages. Although the treatment is elementary, several of the topics covered are drawn from recent research, including the vital area of concurency. The book contains many exercises ranging from simple to miniprojects.Starting with basic set theory, structural operational semantics is introduced as a way to define the meaning of programming languages along with associated proof techniques. Denotational and axiomatic semantics are illustrated on a simple language of while-programs, and fall proofs are given of the equivalence of the operational and denotational semantics and soundness and relative completeness of the axiomatic semantics. A proof of Godel's incompleteness theorem, which emphasizes the impossibility of achieving a fully complete axiomatic semantics, is included. It is supported by an appendix providing an introduction to the theory of computability based on while-programs. Following a presentation of domain theory, the semantics and methods of proof for several functional languages are treated. The simplest language is that of recursion equations with both call-by-value and call-by-name evaluation. This work is extended to lan guages with higher and recursive types, including a treatment of the eager and lazy lambda-calculi. Throughout, the relationship between denotational and operational semantics is stressed, and the proofs of the correspondence between the operation and denotational semantics are provided. The treatment of recursive types - one of the more advanced parts of the book - relies on the use of information systems to represent domains. The book concludes with a chapter on parallel programming languages, accompanied by a discussion of methods for specifying and verifying nondeterministic and parallel programs.




A Practical Introduction to Denotational Semantics


Book Description

Basics - Notation - Lattices - A simple language - Direct semantics - Control - Data structures and data types - A prolog semantics - Miscellaneous.




Compiling Natural Semantics


Book Description

Natural Semantics has become a popular tool among programming language researchers for specifying many aspects of programming languages. However, due to the lack of practical tools for implementation, the natural semantics formalism has so far largely been limited to theoretical applications. This book introduces the rational meta-language RML as a practical language for natural semantics specifications. The main part of the work is devoted to the problem of compiling natural semantics, actually RML, into highly efficient code. For this purpose, an effective compilation strategy for RML is developed and implemented in the rml2c compiler. This compiler ultimately produces low-level C code. Benchmarking results show that rml2c-produced code is much faster than code resulting from compilers based on alternative implementation approaches.




Computational Semantics with Functional Programming


Book Description

Computational semantics is the art and science of computing meaning in natural language. The meaning of a sentence is derived from the meanings of the individual words in it, and this process can be made so precise that it can be implemented on a computer. Designed for students of linguistics, computer science, logic and philosophy, this comprehensive text shows how to compute meaning using the functional programming language Haskell. It deals with both denotational meaning (where meaning comes from knowing the conditions of truth in situations), and operational meaning (where meaning is an instruction for performing cognitive action). Including a discussion of recent developments in logic, it will be invaluable to linguistics students wanting to apply logic to their studies, logic students wishing to learn how their subject can be applied to linguistics, and functional programmers interested in natural language processing as a new application area.




Semantics with Applications: An Appetizer


Book Description

Semantics will play an important role in the future development of software systems and domain-specific languages. This book provides a needed introductory presentation of the fundamental ideas behind these approaches, stresses their relationship by formulating and proving the relevant theorems, and illustrates the applications of semantics in computer science. Historically important application areas are presented together with some exciting potential applications. The text investigates the relationship between various methods and describes some of the main ideas used, illustrating these by means of interesting applications. The book provides a rigorous introduction to the main approaches to formal semantics of programming languages.




Programming Language Syntax and Semantics


Book Description

Contains a treatment of syntax and semantics, and coverage of several complementary semantic methods, with emphasis on using formal specification. There is brief coverage of underlying theory, and an introduction to action semantics - a new method of specifying semantics.




Concrete Semantics


Book Description

Part I of this book is a practical introduction to working with the Isabelle proof assistant. It teaches you how to write functional programs and inductive definitions and how to prove properties about them in Isabelle’s structured proof language. Part II is an introduction to the semantics of imperative languages with an emphasis on applications like compilers and program analysers. The distinguishing feature is that all the mathematics has been formalised in Isabelle and much of it is executable. Part I focusses on the details of proofs in Isabelle; Part II can be read even without familiarity with Isabelle’s proof language, all proofs are described in detail but informally. The book teaches the reader the art of precise logical reasoning and the practical use of a proof assistant as a surgical tool for formal proofs about computer science artefacts. In this sense it represents a formal approach to computer science, not just semantics. The Isabelle formalisation, including the proofs and accompanying slides, are freely available online, and the book is suitable for graduate students, advanced undergraduate students, and researchers in theoretical computer science and logic.




Predicate Calculus and Program Semantics


Book Description

This booklet presents a reasonably self-contained theory of predicate trans former semantics. Predicate transformers were introduced by one of us (EWD) as a means for defining programming language semantics in a way that would directly support the systematic development of programs from their formal specifications. They met their original goal, but as time went on and program derivation became a more and more formal activity, their informal introduction and the fact that many of their properties had never been proved became more and more unsatisfactory. And so did the original exclusion of unbounded nondeterminacy. In 1982 we started to remedy these shortcomings. This little monograph is a result of that work. A possible -and even likely- criticism is that anyone sufficiently versed in lattice theory can easily derive all of our results himself. That criticism would be correct but somewhat beside the point. The first remark is that the average book on lattice theory is several times fatter (and probably less self contained) than this booklet. The second remark is that the predicate transformer semantics provided only one of the reasons for going through the pains of publication.