Lambda the Ultimate

Barry Jay has recently published a book on the Pattern Calculus (which has been discussed before).

The pattern calculus is a new foundation for computation, in which the expressive power of functions and of data structures are combined within pattern-matching functions. The best existing foundations focus on either functions, as in the lambda-calculus, or on data structures, as in Turing machines, or on compromises involving both, as in object-orientation. By contrast, a small typed pattern calculus is able to support all the main programming styles, including functional, imperative, object-oriented and query-based styles, and there is evidence that it can support a language for Web services, able to exploit data structures about which almost nothing is known.

The book covers the operational semantics of both functional and OO features, as well as static and dynamic pattern-matching. Then it covers type systems necessary to deal with all the wild polymorphism thus gained - in rather readable fashion. Then it covers bondi, a programming language based on ML, Java and (lots of!) pattern-matching.