cs173: Assignment 5

Version 2, 2002-11-09 01:30

FAQ

In this assignment, you will work with a typed language that includes numbers, booleans, conditionals, functions, and numeric lists. The concrete syntax for the language is given by the following BNF grammars:

   <expr> ::= <num>
            | true
            | false
            | {+ <expr> <expr>}
            | {- <expr> <expr>}
            | {* <expr> <expr>}
            | {iszero <expr>}
            | {bif <expr> <expr> <expr>}

            | <id>
            | {with {<id> <expr>} <expr>}
            | {fun {<id> : <type>} : <type> <expr>}
            | {<expr> <expr>}

            | nempty
            | {ncons <expr> <expr>}
            | {nempty? <expr>}
            | {nfirst <expr>}
            | {nrest <expr>}

   <type> ::= number
            | boolean
            | nlist
            | (<type> -> <type>)
  

In the surface syntax for types, base types are represented by symbols, and the arrow type by a Scheme list of three elements: the type of the argument, the symbol ->, and the type of the result.

You have not implemented some of these constructs yet, but they should be familiar:

• iszero consumes a number, and returns true if it is 0, false otherwise
• the test expression of bif ("boolean if") must evaluate to true or false
• ncons consumes a number and a numeric list, and produces a numeric list

You have three tasks:

1. Define the function parse, which consumes the concrete representation of a program, and returns its abstract syntax tree. Next, implement interp, which consumes the abstract representation of a program, and produces its value as:

   • a Scheme number,
   • a Scheme boolean,
   • a Scheme list, or
   • the symbol '<procedure>

2. Write down type judgments for the five numeric list constructs: nempty, ncons, nempty?, nfirst, and nrest. You should turn in hard copy to the cs173 handin bin.

3. Implement the function type-of, which consumes the abstract representation of a program (i.e. the result of parse) and an escape continuation that accepts a string. If the program has no type errors, type-of returns the type of the program, using the external representation of types given above. If the program does have a type error, type-of invokes the continuation with a string containing an error message. For example:

         (let/cc esc (type-of (parse '{+ 1 2}) esc))
       

   should produce number, while:

         (let/cc esc (type-of (parse '{3 4}) esc))
       

   might produce "cannot apply a number". (This use of continuations is a primitive form of exceptions.)

FAQ

1. What changed between versions 1 and 2?

   Both type-of and interp should consume the abstract representation of a program produced by the parse function.

   Added braces to the concrete syntax of with.