VDM semantics of programming languages: combinators and monads

The Vienna Development Method (VDM) was developed in the early 1970s as a variant of denotational semantics. VDM descriptions of programming languages differ from the original Scott–Strachey style by making extensive use of combinators which have a fixed operational interpretation. After recalling t...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Formal aspects of computing Vol. 23; no. 2; pp. 221 - 238
Main Author: Mosses, Peter D.
Format: Journal Article
Language:English
Published: London Springer-Verlag 01.03.2011
Springer
Association for Computing Machinery
Springer Verlag
Subjects:
Applied sciences
Computation
Computer Science
Computer science; control theory; systems
Descriptions
Exact sciences and technology
Math Applications in Computer Science
Miscellaneous
Original Article
Programming languages
Semantics
Specifications
Theoretical computing
Theory of Computation
Monads
Denotational semantics
Programming language semantics
VDM
Combinators
Specification language
Computer theory
Programming language
ISSN:0934-5043, 1433-299X
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:The Vienna Development Method (VDM) was developed in the early 1970s as a variant of denotational semantics. VDM descriptions of programming languages differ from the original Scott–Strachey style by making extensive use of combinators which have a fixed operational interpretation. After recalling the main features of denotational semantics and the Scott–Strachey style, we examine the combinators of the VDM specification language, and relate them to monads, which were introduced more than 15 years later. We also suggest that use of further monadic combinators in VDM could be beneficial. Finally, we provide an overview of published VDM semantic descriptions of major programming languages.
Bibliography:SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1
ObjectType-Feature-1
content type line 14
ObjectType-Article-2
content type line 23
ISSN:0934-5043
1433-299X
DOI:10.1007/s00165-009-0145-4