the semantic elegance of applicative languages
In what does the alleged superiority of applicative languages consist? In the last analysis the answer must be in terms of the reduction in the time required to produce a correct program to solve a given problem. On reflection I decided that the best way to demonstrate this would be to take some reasonably non-trivial problem and show how, by proceeding within a certain kind of applicative language framework it was possible to develop a working solution with a fraction of the effort that would have been necessary in a conventional imperative language. The particular problem I have chosen also brings out a number of general points of interest which I shall discuss briefly afterwards. Before proceeding it will be necessary for me to quickly outline the language framework within which we shall be working. Very briefly it can be summarised as (non-strict, higher order) recursion equations + set abstraction. Obviously what matters are the underlying semantic concepts, not the particular syntax that is used to express them, but for the sake of definiteness I shall use the notation of KRC (&equil; Kent RecUrsive Calculator), an applicative programming system implemented at the University of Kent [Turner 81]. KRC is fairly closely based on the earlier language SASL, [Turner 763, but I have added a facility for set abstraction.
semantic language analysis reduction timing program reflectance demonstrate general point order recursion abstraction concept use systems  framework 