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Sum Type
In computer science, a tagged union, also called a variant, variant record, choice type, discriminated union, disjoint union, sum type or coproduct, is a data structure used to hold a value that could take on several different, but fixed, types. Only one of the types can be in use at any one time, and a tag field explicitly indicates which one is in use. It can be thought of as a type that has several "cases", each of which should be handled correctly when that type is manipulated. This is critical in defining recursive datatypes, in which some component of a value may have the same type as the value itself, for example in defining a type for representing trees, where it is necessary to distinguish multi-node subtrees and leaves. Like ordinary unions, tagged unions can save storage by overlapping storage areas for each type, since only one is in use at a time. Description Tagged unions are most important in functional languages such as ML and Haskell, where they are called dataty ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Computer Science
Computer science is the study of computation, automation, and information. Computer science spans theoretical disciplines (such as algorithms, theory of computation, information theory, and automation) to Applied science, practical disciplines (including the design and implementation of Computer architecture, hardware and Computer programming, software). Computer science is generally considered an area of research, academic research and distinct from computer programming. Algorithms and data structures are central to computer science. The theory of computation concerns abstract models of computation and general classes of computational problem, problems that can be solved using them. The fields of cryptography and computer security involve studying the means for secure communication and for preventing Vulnerability (computing), security vulnerabilities. Computer graphics (computer science), Computer graphics and computational geometry address the generation of images. Progr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
ML (programming Language)
ML (Meta Language) is a general-purpose functional programming language. It is known for its use of the polymorphic Hindley–Milner type system, which automatically assigns the types of most expressions without requiring explicit type annotations, and ensures type safetythere is a formal proof that a well-typed ML program does not cause runtime type errors. ML provides pattern matching for function arguments, garbage collection, imperative programming, call-by-value and currying. It is used heavily in programming language research and is one of the few languages to be completely specified and verified using formal semantics. Its types and pattern matching make it well-suited and commonly used to operate on other formal languages, such as in compiler writing, automated theorem proving, and formal verification. Overview Features of ML include a call-by-value evaluation strategy, first-class functions, automatic memory management through garbage collection, parametric polymorph ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Self-describing
In computer programming, self-documenting (or self-describing) source code and user interfaces follow naming conventions and structured programming conventions that enable use of the system without prior specific knowledge. In web development, self-documenting refers to a website that exposes the entire process of its creation through public documentation, and whose public documentation is part of the development process. Objectives Commonly stated objectives for self-documenting systems include: * Make source code easier to read and understand * Minimize the effort required to maintain or extend legacy systems * Reduce the need for users and developers of a system to consult secondary documentation sources such as code comments or software manuals * Facilitate automation through self-contained knowledge representation Conventions Self-documenting code is ostensibly written using human-readable names, typically consisting of a phrase in a human language which reflects the symb ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tagged Pointer
In computer science, a tagged pointer is a pointer (concretely a memory address) with additional data associated with it, such as an indirection bit or reference count. This additional data is often "folded" into the pointer, meaning stored inline in the data representing the address, taking advantage of certain properties of memory addressing. The name comes from "tagged architecture" systems, which reserved bits at the hardware level to indicate the significance of each word; the additional data is called a "tag" or "tags", though strictly speaking "tag" refers to data specifying a ''type,'' not other data; however, the usage "tagged pointer" is ubiquitous. Folding tags into the pointer There are various techniques for folding tags into a pointer. Most architectures are byte-addressable (the smallest addressable unit is a byte), but certain types of data will often be '' aligned'' to the size of the data, often a word or multiple thereof. This discrepancy leaves a few of the lea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Indirection Bit
Addressing modes are an aspect of the instruction set architecture in most central processing unit (CPU) designs. The various addressing modes that are defined in a given instruction set architecture define how the machine language instructions in that architecture identify the operand(s) of each instruction. An addressing mode specifies how to calculate the effective memory address of an operand by using information held in registers and/or constants contained within a machine instruction or elsewhere. In computer programming, addressing modes are primarily of interest to those who write in assembly languages and to compiler writers. For a related concept see orthogonal instruction set which deals with the ability of any instruction to use any addressing mode. Caveats Note that there is no generally accepted way of naming the various addressing modes. In particular, different authors and computer manufacturers may give different names to the same addressing mode, or the same na ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
CDR Coding
In computer science CDR coding is a compressed data representation for Lisp linked lists. It was developed and patented by the MIT Artificial Intelligence Laboratory, and implemented in computer hardware in a number of Lisp machines derived from the MIT CADR. CDR coding is in fact a fairly general idea; whenever a data object ''A'' ends in a reference to another data structure ''B'', we can instead place the structure ''B'' itself there, overlapping and running off the end of ''A''. By doing this we free the space required by the reference, which can add up if done many times, and also improve locality of reference, enhancing performance on modern machines. The transformation is especially effective for the cons-based lists it was created for; we free about half of the space for each node we perform this transformation on. It is not always possible to perform this substitution, because there might not be a large enough chunk of free space beyond the end of A. Thus, some objects w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arbitrary-precision Arithmetic
In computer science, arbitrary-precision arithmetic, also called bignum arithmetic, multiple-precision arithmetic, or sometimes infinite-precision arithmetic, indicates that calculations are performed on numbers whose digits of precision are limited only by the available memory of the host system. This contrasts with the faster fixed-precision arithmetic found in most arithmetic logic unit (ALU) hardware, which typically offers between 8 and 64 bits of precision. Several modern programming languages have built-in support for bignums, and others have libraries available for arbitrary-precision integer and floating-point math. Rather than storing values as a fixed number of bits related to the size of the processor register, these implementations typically use variable-length arrays of digits. Arbitrary precision is used in applications where the speed of arithmetic is not a limiting factor, or where precise results with very large numbers are required. It should not be confu ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Class Hierarchy
A class hierarchy or inheritance tree in computer science is a classification of object types, denoting objects as the instantiations of classes (class is like a blueprint, the object is what is built from that blueprint) inter-relating the various classes by relationships such as "inherits", "extends", "is an abstraction of", "an interface definition". In object-oriented programming, a class is a template that defines the state and behavior common to objects of a certain kind. A class can be defined in terms of other classes. The concept of class hierarchy in computer science is very similar to taxonomy, the classifications of species. The relationships are specified in the science of object-oriented design and object interface standards defined by popular use, language designers (Java, C++, Smalltalk, Visual Prolog) and standards committees for software design like the Object Management Group. The class hierarchy can be as deep as needed. The Instance variables and methods a ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lazy Evaluation
In programming language theory, lazy evaluation, or call-by-need, is an evaluation strategy which delays the evaluation of an expression until its value is needed (non-strict evaluation) and which also avoids repeated evaluations (sharing). The benefits of lazy evaluation include: * The ability to define control flow (structures) as abstractions instead of primitives. * The ability to define potentially infinite data structures. This allows for more straightforward implementation of some algorithms. * The ability to define partially-defined data structures where some elements are errors. This allows for rapid prototyping. Lazy evaluation is often combined with memoization, as described in Jon Bentley's ''Writing Efficient Programs''. After a function's value is computed for that parameter or set of parameters, the result is stored in a lookup table that is indexed by the values of those parameters; the next time the function is called, the table is consulted to determine whe ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rope (data Structure)
In computer programming, a rope, or cord, is a data structure composed of smaller strings that is used to efficiently store and manipulate a very long string. For example, a text editing program may use a rope to represent the text being edited, so that operations such as insertion, deletion, and random access can be done efficiently. Description A rope is a binary tree where each leaf (end node) holds a string and a length (also known as a "weight"), and each node further up the tree holds the sum of the lengths of all the leaves in its left subtree. A node with two children thus divides the whole string into two parts: the left subtree stores the first part of the string, the right subtree stores the second part of the string, and a node's weight is the length of the first part. For rope operations, the strings stored in nodes are assumed to be constant immutable objects in the typical nondestructive case, allowing for some copy-on-write behavior. Leaf nodes are usually implem ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Unit Type
In the area of mathematical logic and computer science known as type theory, a unit type is a type that allows only one value (and thus can hold no information). The carrier (underlying set) associated with a unit type can be any singleton set. There is an isomorphism between any two such sets, so it is customary to talk about ''the'' unit type and ignore the details of its value. One may also regard the unit type as the type of 0-tuples, i.e. the product of no types. The unit type is the terminal object in the category of types and typed functions. It should not be confused with the ''zero'' or bottom type, which allows ''no'' values and is the initial object in this category. Similarly, the Boolean is the type with ''two'' values. The unit type is implemented in most functional programming languages. The void type that is used in some imperative programming languages serves some of its functions, but because its carrier set is empty, it has some limitations (as detailed below ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Enumerated Type
In computer programming, an enumerated type (also called enumeration, enum, or factor in the R programming language, and a categorical variable in statistics) is a data type consisting of a set of named values called ''elements'', ''members'', ''enumeral'', or ''enumerators'' of the type. The enumerator names are usually identifiers that behave as constants in the language. An enumerated type can be seen as a degenerate tagged union of unit type. A variable that has been declared as having an enumerated type can be assigned any of the enumerators as a value. In other words, an enumerated type has values that are different from each other, and that can be compared and assigned, but are not specified by the programmer as having any particular concrete representation in the computer's memory; compilers and interpreters can represent them arbitrarily. For example, the four suits in a deck of playing cards may be four enumerators named ''Club'', ''Diamond'', ''Heart'', and ''Spade'' ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
