CS655 TTh 12 30 13 45 MEC216 Spring 1999 COURSE TITLE Programming Languages REQUIRED BACKGROUND Undergraduate course on analysis of programming languages Working knowledge of the equivalent of an undergraduate text such as Sebesta s Concepts of Programming Languages Benjamin Cummings 2nd Edition 1993 or 3rd Edition 1996 TEXTBOOK Recommended not required Sethi R Programming Languages Concepts and Constructs 2nd Edition Addison Wesley 1996 COURSE DESCRIPTION The goal of this course is to ensure you are well informed about 1 the history of programming languages 2 design issues affecting languages and 3 current research issues in the design and implementation of programming languages The history of high level language design will be a thread running through the course We will look at design principles establishing a working set of principles that will then apply to better known high level languages Also we will focus on current research issues including formal semantics verification object oriented languages meta classes polymorphism exception handling very high level languages non determinism and parallel languages This will be a papers oriented course INSTRUCTOR Paul F Reynolds Jr OFFICE Olsson 214 HOURS TTh 3 30 5 00PM by appointment reynolds virginia edu 924 1039 E mail entertained anytime Also there is a homepage for CS655 check it daily http www cs virginia edu CS655 TA Jim Gunderson gunders virginia edu Hours by appointment E mail entertained anytime ASSIGNMENTS Numerous reading assignments homework assignments and a project In general you will be asked to write short response papers to the papers you read Also problems related to papers will be assigned The project will be analysis oriented you will be writing and analyzing programs you write in some of the languages we investigate EXAMS A midterm and a final Midterm will be T TH 23 25 March take home EVALUATION The midterm counts 20 the final counts 30 homework is 15 the project is 25 and class participation is 10 Not all homework assignments will be graded but you are expected to do all assigned work Also you are expected to be prepared for class discussions doing the homework helps PLEDGE POLICY All work in this course will be pledged If you are not familiar with the university s pledge policy contact a student honor advisor or see me Essentially all work should be your own You are to work alone unless I give you explicit permission to work in collaboration with others The project will be a pledged collaborative effort In all work please cite appropriate references e g any ideas that are not completely your own Also unless told otherwise you may make full use of library resources including the web However do not remove material from libraries if it would be a potential detriment to others in the class for example if the library only has one remaining copy Either use the resource there or copy it TOPICS Historical overview Language paradigms Design principles Language analysis FORTRAN s ALGOL60 ALGOL68 PL I Pascal C Icon CLU LISP Scheme Ada83 Ada95 C Smalltalk Python Sather Eiffel Prolog ML Haskell Java Self Unity Interesting research areas Language type systems polymorphism type inference Meta classes and other advanced object oriented language features Pattern matching and lazy evaluation Garbage collection and memory management Reliability features such as exception handling and design by contract Formal semantics and mathematical models Program verification FOCUS This course can be fun I do my best to make it that way by exposing you to those aspects of language design that are fun to think about If there s a topic you d like to see covered or if there s an approach to exploring issues you d like to take please feel free to speak up In general the more you get involved in the class the better it is for all of us There is a heavy emphasis on reading reacting and writing in this course My thought is that these skills are good ones to sharpen and this course is a good place to do it As a result programming is deemphasized somewhat we can t do it all Some students would rather have more programming and less reading and writing I know this from years of reading through course evaluations the project is meant to be your opportunity to experiment with using languages If programming is your forte use the main project as your opportunity to exploit it And of course you are encouraged to explore any language we may be covering on your own The web has made access to translators as well as discussions about just about every language that s ever existed quite easy I encourage you to use the web resources to their fullest extent for all of the work you do in this class Be sure to treat the web as you would should any other written source of material if you use it cite it