research-article

Type systems for the masses: deriving soundness proofs and efficient checkers

Authors:

Sebastian Erdweg,

Pascal Wittmann,

Mira MeziniAuthors Info & Claims

Onward! 2015: 2015 ACM International Symposium on New Ideas, New Paradigms, and Reflections on Programming and Software (Onward!)

Pages 137 - 150

https://doi.org/10.1145/2814228.2814239

Published: 21 October 2015 Publication History

Abstract

The correct definition and implementation of non-trivial type systems is difficult and requires expert knowledge, which is not available to developers of domain-specific languages (DSLs) in practice. We propose Veritas, a workbench that simplifies the development of sound type systems. Veritas provides a single, high-level specification language for type systems, from which it automatically tries to derive soundness proofs and efficient and correct type-checking algorithms. For verification, Veritas combines off-the-shelf automated first-order theorem provers with automated proof strategies specific to type systems. For deriving efficient type checkers, Veritas provides a collection of optimization strategies whose applicability to a given type system is checked through verification on a case-by-case basis. We have developed a prototypical implementation of Veritas and used it to verify type soundness of the simply-typed lambda calculus and of parts of typed SQL. Our experience suggests that many of the individual verification steps can be automated and, in particular, that a high degree of automation is possible for type systems of DSLs.

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Cited By

Galasso SCimini M(2024)Language-parameterized Proofs for Functional Languages with SubtypingFunctional and Logic Programming10.1007/978-981-97-2300-3_15(291-310)Online publication date: 15-May-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/978-981-97-2300-3_15
Cimini M(2023)A Declarative Validator for GSOS LanguagesElectronic Proceedings in Theoretical Computer Science10.4204/EPTCS.378.2378(14-25)Online publication date: 13-Apr-2023
https://doi.org/10.4204/EPTCS.378.2
Cimini M(2023)Towards the Complexity Analysis of Programming Language Proof MethodsTheoretical Aspects of Computing – ICTAC 202310.1007/978-3-031-47963-2_8(100-118)Online publication date: 4-Dec-2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/978-3-031-47963-2_8
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Index Terms

Type systems for the masses: deriving soundness proofs and efficient checkers
1. Computing methodologies
  1. Artificial intelligence
    1. Knowledge representation and reasoning
  2. Symbolic and algebraic manipulation
    1. Symbolic and algebraic algorithms
      1. Theorem proving algorithms
2. Theory of computation
  1. Logic
  2. Semantics and reasoning
    1. Program reasoning

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cover image ACM Conferences

Onward! 2015: 2015 ACM International Symposium on New Ideas, New Paradigms, and Reflections on Programming and Software (Onward!)

October 2015

307 pages

ISBN:9781450336888

DOI:10.1145/2814228

Program Chairs:
Gail C. Murphy
University of British Columbia, Canada
,
Guy L. Steele Jr.

Copyright © 2015 ACM.

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Published: 21 October 2015

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Cited By

Galasso SCimini M(2024)Language-parameterized Proofs for Functional Languages with SubtypingFunctional and Logic Programming10.1007/978-981-97-2300-3_15(291-310)Online publication date: 15-May-2024
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/978-981-97-2300-3_15
Cimini M(2023)A Declarative Validator for GSOS LanguagesElectronic Proceedings in Theoretical Computer Science10.4204/EPTCS.378.2378(14-25)Online publication date: 13-Apr-2023
https://doi.org/10.4204/EPTCS.378.2
Cimini M(2023)Towards the Complexity Analysis of Programming Language Proof MethodsTheoretical Aspects of Computing – ICTAC 202310.1007/978-3-031-47963-2_8(100-118)Online publication date: 4-Dec-2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/978-3-031-47963-2_8
Cimini M(2023)Testing Languages with a Languages-as-Databases ApproachTests and Proofs10.1007/978-3-031-38828-6_7(108-126)Online publication date: 18-Jul-2023
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/978-3-031-38828-6_7
Cimini MFischer BBurgueño LCazzola W(2022)Lang-n-Prove: A DSL for Language ProofsProceedings of the 15th ACM SIGPLAN International Conference on Software Language Engineering10.1145/3567512.3567514(16-29)Online publication date: 29-Nov-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3567512.3567514
Cimini M(2022)A Query Language for Language AnalysisSoftware Engineering and Formal Methods10.1007/978-3-031-17108-6_4(57-73)Online publication date: 26-Sep-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/978-3-031-17108-6_4
Cimini M(2022)A Calculus for Multi-language Operational SemanticsSoftware Verification10.1007/978-3-030-95561-8_3(25-42)Online publication date: 22-Feb-2022
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-95561-8_3
Pacak AErdweg SSzabó T(2020)A systematic approach to deriving incremental type checkersProceedings of the ACM on Programming Languages10.1145/34281954:OOPSLA(1-28)Online publication date: 13-Nov-2020
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3428195
Pearce D(2017)Rewriting for sound and complete union, intersection and negation typesACM SIGPLAN Notices10.1145/3170492.313604252:12(117-130)Online publication date: 23-Oct-2017
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3170492.3136042
Bach Poulsen CRouvoet ATolmach AKrebbers RVisser E(2017)Intrinsically-typed definitional interpreters for imperative languagesProceedings of the ACM on Programming Languages10.1145/31581042:POPL(1-34)Online publication date: 27-Dec-2017
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3158104
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