Comparative Metric Semantics of Programming Languages: Nondeterminism and Recursion (Progress in Theoretical Computer Science) - Hardcover

Breughel, Franck Van

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0817639276 ISBN 13: 9780817639273

Publisher: Birkhauser Boston Inc, 1997

Synopsis

During the last three decades several different styles of semantics for program­ ming languages have been developed. This book compares two of them: the operational and the denotational approach. On the basis of several exam­ ples we show how to define operational and denotational semantic models for programming languages. Furthermore, we introduce a general technique for comparing various semantic models for a given language. We focus on different degrees of nondeterminism in programming lan­ guages. Nondeterminism arises naturally in concurrent languages. It is also an important concept in specification languages. In the examples discussed, the degree of non determinism ranges from a choice between two alternatives to a choice between a collection of alternatives indexed by a closed interval of the real numbers. The former arises in a language with nondeterministic choices. A real time language with dense choices gives rise to the latter. We also consider the nondeterministic random assignment and parallel composition, both couched in a simple language. Besides non determinism our four example languages contain some form of recursion, a key ingredient of programming languages.

Edition details

• Publisher: Birkhauser Boston Inc
• Publication date: 1997
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0817639276
• ISBN 13: 9780817639273
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 240