Papers for

debugging tool developers

Papers whose findings have a practical use for this group, as judged from the abstract. Open a paper to read what it means in practice.

L4 reversible intermediate language supports reversible program compilation

The Reversible Intermediate Language L4, its Type System, and its Bidirectional Small-Step Semantics

Abstract: L4 is a generic, reversible, linearly-typed, low-level language intended as an intermediate language for compiling reversible programming languages to reversible machines. L4 is intended to replace and generalise RSSA, a reversible SSA form. Inspiration is drawn from other low-level reversible languages such as HSSA. In this paper, we define L4 first informally, and then give a formal type system and a bidirectional small-step semantics for L4: The rules have direction indicators to determine forwards or backwards execution, and the direction can be changed during execution.

Thu 22 OctProgramming Languages

The gist

Reversible computing involves running programs both forward and backward to save energy or improve debugging. The authors present L4, a new programming language designed to be an intermediate step that helps compile reversible programs efficiently for reversible machines. L4 has a special type system that manages how data is used only once (linear types) and supports execution in both directions. The authors also define formal rules that precisely describe how programs run forward and backward in small steps.

Open → 2610.31201v1