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A New Module System for Prolog

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Computational Logic — CL 2000 (CL 2000)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNAI,volume 1861))

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Abstract

It is now widely accepted that separating programs into modules is useful in program development and maintenance. While many Prolog implementations include useful module systems, we argue that these systems can be improved in a number of ways, such as, for example, being more amenable to effective global analysis and transformation and allowing separate compilation or sensible creation of standalone executables. We discuss a number of issues related to the design of such an improved module system for Prolog and propose some novel solutions. Based on this, we present the choices made in the Ciao module system, which has been designed to meet a number of objectives: allowing separate compilation, extensibility in features and in syntax, amenability to modular global analysis and transformation, enhanced error detection, support for meta-programming and higher-order, compatibility to the extent possible with official and de-facto standards, etc.

This work was supported in part by the “EDIPIA” (CICYT TIC99-1151) and “ECCOSIC” (Fulbright 98059) projects. The authors would like to thank Francisco Bueno and the anonymous referees for their useful comments on previous versions of this document. The Ciao system is a collaborative international effort and includes contributions from members of several institutions, which are too many to mention here: a complete list can be found in the Ciao system documentation.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Science, Technical U. of Madrid (UPM), Spain

    Daniel Cabeza & Manuel Hermenegildo

Authors
  1. Daniel Cabeza
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  2. Manuel Hermenegildo
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. The Australian National University, Australia

    John Lloyd

  2. Simon Fraser University, Canada

    Veronica Dahl

  3. Universität Koblenz, Germany

    Ulrich Furbach

  4. The University of Birmingham, UK

    Manfred Kerber

  5. University of Manchester, UK

    Kung-Kiu Lau

  6. The Pennsylvania State University, USA

    Catuscia Palamidessi

  7. Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Portugal

    Luís Moniz Pereira

  8. The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel

    Yehoshua Sagiv

  9. The University of Melbourne, Australia

    Peter J. Stuckey

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© 2000 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Cabeza, D., Hermenegildo, M. (2000). A New Module System for Prolog. In: Lloyd, J., et al. Computational Logic — CL 2000. CL 2000. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 1861. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-44957-4_9

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-44957-4_9

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-67797-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-44957-7

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