Abstract
We show how application of commutative-like laws can improve binding time properties. The quality of residual programs obtained by partial evaluation depends crucially on the binding time properties of the source program. Likewise does the sharing obtained by full laziness depend on the binding time properties of the program. This paper suggest that the commutative-like laws, derivable from the types of polymorphic functions using the “free theorems” approach, gives rise to a large set of non-trivial binding time improving transformations. The paper runs through a number of examples and shows how these laws can be applied in a rather systematic way to achieve binding time improvements. Ultimately it is our hope to automate the derivation and application of these binding time improving transformations.
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Holst, C.K., Hughes, J. (1991). Towards Binding-Time Improvement for Free. In: Jones, S.L.P., Hutton, G., Holst, C.K. (eds) Functional Programming, Glasgow 1990. Workshops in Computing. Springer, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4471-3810-5_8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4471-3810-5_8
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