An exploration of program as language

13 years 8 months ago

Download staff.cs.utu.fi

In this paper we explore the idea that the code that constitutes a program actually forms a higher-level, program speciﬁc language. The symbols of the language are the abstractions of the program, and the grammar of the language is the set of (generally unwritten) rules about the allowable coms of those abstractions. As such, a program is both a language deﬁnition, and the only use of that language. This speciﬁcity means that reading a never-before encountered program involves learning a new natural language, and that porting code from one program to another requires translation from one natural language into another. We suggest that the complexity and depth of the program language is affected by the gap between the program semantics (what the program is meant to do) and the code semantics (the way in which the machine runs). We believe that in seeing that programs are languages, we gain new insight into our own experience as programmers, and are able to gain new perspective on ...

Elisa L. A. Baniassad, Clayton G. Myers

Real-time Traffic