Lambda the Ultimate

The Deca programming language is "a language designed to provide the advanced features of sophisticated, high-level programming languages while still programming as close as possible to the bare metal. It brings in the functional, object-oriented, and generic programming paradigms without requiring a garbage collector or a threading system, so programmers really only pay in performance for the features they use." The latter link provides a list of features that Deca does, will, and won't provide. Features provided include type inference, universally- and existentially- quantified types, and "a strong region-and-effect system that prohibits unsafe escaping pointers and double-free errors".

The Deca language and ideas behind it are documented in a thesis, The design and implementation of a modern systems programming language (PDF):

Low-level systems programming has remained one of the most consistently difficult tasks in software engineering, since systems programmers must routinely deal with details that programming-language and systems researchers have preferred to abstract away. At least partially, the difficulty arises from not applying the state of the art in programming-languages research to systems programming. I therefore describe the design and implementation of Deca, a systems language based on modern PL principles. Deca makes use of decades in programming-languages research, particularly drawing from the state of the art in functional programming, type systems, extensible data-types and subroutines, modularity, and systems programming-languages research. I describe Deca's feature-set, examine the relevant literature, explain design decisions, and give some of the implementation details for Deca language features. I have been writing a compiler for Deca to translate it into machine code, and I describe the overall architecture of this compiler and some of its details.

The source code for the Deca compiler, decac, is available here. The compiler is implemented in Scala and generates LLVM bytecode. (The author points out in the comments below that this implementation is a work in progress.)

The author of Deca is LtU member Eli Gottlieb, who back in 2008 posted in the forum asking for feedback on his language: Practical Bits of Making a Compiler for a New Language.

There's some more discussion of Deca over at Hacker News.

The Experimental Effectiveness of Mathematical Proof

The aim of this paper is twofold. First, it is an attempt to give an answer to the famous essay of Eugene Wigner about the unreasonable effectiveness of mathematics in the natural sciences [25]. We will argue that mathematics are not only reasonably effective, but that they are also objectively effective in a sense that can be given a precise meaning. For that—and this is the second aim of this paper—we shall reconsider some aspects of Popper’s epistemology [23] in the light of recent advances of proof theory [8, 20], in order to clarify the interaction between pure mathematical reasoning (in the sense of a formal system) and the use of empirical hypotheses (in the sense of the natural sciences).

The technical contribution of this paper is the proof-theoretic analysis of the problem (already evoked in [23]) of the experimental modus tollens, that deals with the combination of a formal proof of the implication U ⇒ V with an experimental falsification of V to get an experimental falsification of U in the case where the formulæ U and V express empirical theories in a sense close to Popper’s. We propose a practical solution to this problem based on Krivine’s theory of classical realizability [20], and describe a simple procedure to extract from a formal proof of U ⇒ V (formalized in classical second-order arithmetic) and a falsifying instance of V a computer program that performs a finite sequence of tests on the empirical theory U until it finds (in finite time) a falsifying instance of U.

I thought I had already posted this, but apparently not.

Consider this paper the main gauntlet thrown down to those who insist that mathematical logic, the Curry-Howard Isomorphism, etc. might be fine for "algorithmic code" (as if there were any other kind) but is somehow inapplicable the moment a system interacts with the "real" or "outside" world (as if software weren't real).

Update: the author is Alexandre Miquel, and the citation is "Chapitre du livre Anachronismes logiques, à paraître dans la collection Logique, Langage, Sciences, Philosophie, aux Publications de la Sorbonne. Éd.: Myriam Quatrini et Samuel Tronçon, 2010."

Andrej Bauer's blog contains the PL Zoo project. In particular, the Levy language, a toy implementation of Paul Levy's CBPV in OCaml.

If you're curious about CBPV, this implementation might be a nice accompaniment to the book, or simply a hands on way to check it out.

It looks like an implementation of CBPV without sum and product types, with complex values, and without effects. I guess a more hands-on way to get to grips with CBPV would be to implement any of these missing features.

The posts are are 3 years old, but I've only just noticed them. The PL Zoo project was briefly mentioned here.

Milawa: A Self-Verifying Theorem Prover for an ACL2-Like Logic

Milawa is a "self-verifying" theorem prover for an ACL2-like logic.

We begin with a simple proof checker, call it A, which is short enough to verify by the "social process" of mathematics.

We then develop a series of increasingly powerful proof checkers, call them B, C, D, and so on. We show that each of these is sound: they accept only the same formulas as A. We use A to verify B, and B to verify C, and so on. Then, since we trust A, and A says B is sound, we can trust B, and so on for C, D, and the rest.

Our final proof checker is really a theorem prover; it can carry out a goal-directed proof search using assumptions, calculation, rewrite rules, and so on. We use this theorem prover to discover the proofs of soundness for B, C, and so on, and to emit these proofs in a format that A can check. Hence, "self verifying."

This might help inform discussions of the relationship between the de Bruijn criterion (the "social process" of mathematics) and formal verification. I think it also serves as an interesting signpost on the road forward: it's one thing to say that starting with a de Bruijn core and evolving a more powerful prover is possible in principle; it's another thing for it to actually have been done. The author's thesis defense slides provide a nice, quick overview.

A Lambda Calculus for Real Analysis

Abstract Stone Duality is a revolutionary paradigm for general topology that describes computable continuous functions directly, without using set theory, infinitary lattice theory or a prior theory of discrete computation. Every expression in the calculus denotes both a continuous function and a program, and the reasoning looks remarkably like a sanitised form of that in classical topology. This is an introduction to ASD for the general mathematician, with application to elementary real analysis.

This language is applied to the Intermediate Value Theorem: the solution of equations for continuous functions on the real line. As is well known from both numerical and constructive considerations, the equation cannot be solved if the function "hovers" near 0, whilst tangential solutions will never be found.

In ASD, both of these failures and the general method of finding solutions of the equation when they exist are explained by the new concept of overtness. The zeroes are captured, not as a set, but by higher-type modal operators. Unlike the Brouwer degree, these are defined and (Scott) continuous across singularities of a parametric equation.

Expressing topology in terms of continuous functions rather than sets of points leads to treatments of open and closed concepts that are very closely lattice- (or de Morgan-) dual, without the double negations that are found in intuitionistic approaches. In this, the dual of compactness is overtness. Whereas meets and joins in locale theory are asymmetrically finite and infinite, they have overt and compact indices in ASD.

Overtness replaces metrical properties such as total boundedness, and cardinality conditions such as having a countable dense subset. It is also related to locatedness in constructive analysis and recursive enumerability in recursion theory.

Paul Taylor is deadly serious about the intersection of logic, mathematics, and computation. I came across this after beating my head against Probability Theory: The Logic of Science and Axiomatic Theory of Economics over the weekend, realizing that my math just wasn't up to the tasks, and doing a Google search for "constructive real analysis." "Real analysis" because it was obvious that that was what both of the aforementioned texts were relying on; "constructive" because I'd really like to develop proofs in Coq/extract working code from them. This paper was on the second page of results. Paul's name was familiar (and not just because I share it with him); he translated Jean-Yves Girard's regrettably out-of-print Proofs and Types to English and maintains a very popular set of tools for typesetting commutative diagrams using LaTeX.

Syntactic Proofs of Compositional Compiler Correctness

Semantic preservation by compilers for higher-order languages can be verified using simple syntactic methods. At the heart of classic techniques are relations between source-level and target-level values. Unfortunately, these relations are specific to particular compilers, leading to correctness theorems that have nothing to say about linking programs with functions compiled by other compilers or written by hand in the target language. Theorems based on logical relations manage to avoid this problem, but at a cost: standard logical relations do not apply directly to programs with non-termination or impurity, and extensions to handle those features are relatively complicated, compared to the classical compiler verification literature.

In this paper, we present a new approach to “open” compiler correctness theorems that is “syntactic” in the sense that the core relations do not refer to semantics. Though the technique is much more elementary than previous proposals, it scales up nicely to realistic languages. In particular, untyped and impure programs may be handled simply, while previous work has addressed neither in this context.

Our approach is based on the observation that it is an unnecessary handicap to consider proofs as black boxes. We identify some theorem-specific proof skeletons, such that we can define an algebra of nondeterministic compilations and their proofs, and we can compose any two compilations to produce a correct-by-construction result. We have prototyped these ideas with a Coq implementation of multiple CPS translations for an untyped Mini-ML source language with recursive functions, sums, products, mutable references, and exceptions.

A submitted draft of another paper from Adam, continuing to expand LambdaTamer's reach.

A Verified Compiler for an Impure Functional Language

We present a verified compiler to an idealized assembly language from a small, untyped functional language with mutable references and exceptions. The compiler is programmed in the Coq proof assistant and has a proof of total correctness with respect to big-step operational semantics for the source and target languages. Compilation is staged and includes standard phases like translation to continuation-passing style and closure conversion, as well as a common subexpression elimination optimization. In this work, our focus has been on discovering and using techniques that make our proofs easy to engineer and maintain. While most programming language work with proof assistants uses very manual proof styles, all of our proofs are implemented as adaptive programs in Coq's tactic language, making it possible to reuse proofs unchanged as new language features are added.

In this paper, we focus especially on phases of compilation that rearrange the structure of syntax with nested variable binders. That aspect has been a key challenge area in past compiler verification projects, with much more effort expended in the statement and proof of binder-related lemmas than is found in standard pencil-and-paper proofs. We show how to exploit the representation technique of parametric higher-order abstract syntax to avoid the need to prove any of the usual lemmas about binder manipulation, often leading to proofs that are actually shorter than their pencil-and-paper analogues. Our strategy is based on a new approach to encoding operational semantics which delegates all concerns about substitution to the meta language, without using features incompatible with general purpose type theories like Coq's logic.

Further work on/with LambdaTamer for certified compiler development.

Certified Programming With Dependent Types

From the introduction:

We would all like to have programs check that our programs are correct. Due in no small part to some bold but unfulfilled promises in the history of computer science, today most people who write software, practitioners and academics alike, assume that the costs of formal program verification outweigh the benefits. The purpose of this book is to convince you that the technology of program verification is mature enough today that it makes sense to use it in a support role in many kinds of research projects in computer science. Beyond the convincing, I also want to provide a handbook on practical engineering of certified programs with the Coq proof assistant.

This is the best Coq tutorial that I know of, partially for being comprehensive, and partially for taking a very different tack than most with Adam's emphasis on proof automation using Coq's Ltac tactic language. It provides an invaluable education toward understanding what's going on either in LambdaTamer or Ynot, both of which are important projects in their own rights.

Please note that Adam is explicitly requesting feedback on this work.

A Verified Compiler for an Impure Functional Language

We present a verified compiler to an idealized assembly language from a small, untyped functional language with mutable references and exceptions. The compiler is programmed in the Coq proof assistant and has a proof of total correctness with respect to big-step operational semantics for the source and target languages. Compilation is staged and includes standard phases like translation to continuation-passing style and closure conversion, as well as a common subexpression elimination optimization. In this work, our focus has been on discovering and using techniques that make our proofs easy to engineer and maintain. While most programming language work with proof assistants uses very manual proof styles, all of our proofs are implemented as adaptive programs in Coq’s tactic language, making it possible to reuse proofs unchanged as new language features are added.

In this paper, we focus especially on phases of compilation that rearrange the structure of syntax with nested variable binders. That aspect has been a key challenge area in past compiler verification projects, with much more effort expended in the statement and proof of binder-related lemmas than is found in standard pencil-and-paper proofs. We show how to exploit the representation technique of parametric higher-order abstract syntax to avoid the need to prove any of the usual lemmas about binder manipulation, often leading to proofs that are actually shorter than their pencil-and-paper analogues. Our strategy is based on a new approach to encoding operational semantics which delegates all concerns about substitution to the meta language, without using features incompatible with general-purpose type theories like Coq’s logic.

The latest from Adam Chlipala. Yet another evolutionary step for Lambda Tamer. Between this and Ynot the Coq/certified compiler story seems to be getting more impressive nearly daily.

Lambda calculus as animated alligators and eggs. Virtually guaranteed to turn any 4 year old into a PLT geek.

The non-animated game was mentioned previously on LTU here.