Abstract Computing Machines: A Lambda Calculus Perspective (Texts in Theoretical Computer Science. An EATCS Series) [Paperback]

Werner Kluge (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: December 15, 2010 | ISBN-10: 3642059384 | ISBN-13: 978-3642059384 | Edition: Softcover reprint of hardcover 1st ed. 2005

The book emphasizes the design of full-fledged, fully normalizing lambda calculus machinery, as opposed to the just weakly normalizing machines.

Editorial Reviews

Review

From the reviews: "This remarkable monograph is an extremely well-written and pleasant and reading about abstract computing machines … . The author chooses a somewhat ‘imperative’ approach to teaching, which results in the survey of a vast number of concepts provided with many useful examples. The expository style is most favourable, which could be of special value for a reader with no strong background in the area. … Altogether, this is a book worth reading." (Vladimir Komendantsky, Mathematical Reviews, Issue 2007 k)

From the Back Cover

The book addresses ways and means of organizing computations, highlighting the relationship between algorithms and the basic mechanisms and runtime structures necessary to execute them using machines. It completely abstracts from concrete programming languages and machine architectures, taking instead the lambda calculus as the basic programming and program execution model to design various abstract machines for its correct implementation. The emphasis is on fully normalizing machines based on full-fledged beta-reductions as essential prerequisites for symbolic computations that treat functions and variables truly as first-class objects. Their weakly normalizing counterparts are shown to be functional abstract machines that sacrifice the flavors of full beta-reductions for decidedly simpler runtime structures and improved runtime efficiency. Further downgrading of the lambda calculus leads to classical imperative machines that permit side-effecting operations on the runtime environment.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 398 pages
• Publisher: Springer; Softcover reprint of hardcover 1st ed. 2005 edition (December 15, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 3642059384
• ISBN-13: 978-3642059384
• Product Dimensions: 9.1 x 6.1 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #6,136,746 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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