[META] Version: Draft — v0.0.4 License: CC BY-NC-ND Text to 80 columns (except tables): Markdown: Markdown restricted to 80 columns (except tables): HTML: All four compressed: 1. Scope And Conformance [META-SCOPE] 1.1. Normative Language [META-NORM] [META-NORM-01] The terms MUST, MUST NOT, SHOULD, SHOULD NOT, and MAY indicate rule strength: [META-NORM-02] Every normative rule MUST have a stable identifier. An identifier MUST define its requirement in exactly 1 location; other rules SHOULD refer to that identifier instead of restating it. [META-NORM-03] Unidentified prose, diagrams, and worked examples are nonnormative.…
Tag: Computer Science
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Author: Asher Wolfstein Published under the auspices of the University of Neo-Transylvania Experimental Research This is Part 7 of a proposed 18-part series titled Failed Abstractions: Interfaces Gone Wild. Optimization involves replacing one program form or execution plan with a more optimal version, and it is based on the claim that the change preserves the relevant aspects of the given semantic contract. For example, These techniques are essential to much of contemporary performance engineering, and the validity of these methods can range from heuristic confidence based on testing…
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Author: Asher Wolfstein Published under the auspices of the University of Neo-Transylvania Experimental Research This is Part 6 of a proposed 18-part series titled Failed Abstractions: Interfaces Gone Wild. An Intermediate Representation (IR) is a carefully selected description of a program, being designed in such a way that a certain set of questions can more easily be posed and answered. A typed tree makes the declarations, the applications, and the properties that are inferred explicit; a control-flow graph makes the various transfers of execution available for use in…
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Author: Asher Wolfstein Published under the auspices of the University of Neo-Transylvania Experimental Research This is Part 5 of a proposed 18-part series titled Failed Abstractions: Interfaces Gone Wild. Compilation provides an expression defined in an abstract language with an executable form for another operational system, while lowering involves the (sometimes gradual) elimination, or breakdown, of features that the target system does not directly support. Some examples include: Such modifications represent engineering achievements that undeniably involve specifications for correctness and even, in some cases, proofs. Moreover, such changes…
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Author: Asher Wolfstein Published under the auspices of the University of Neo-Transylvania Experimental Research This is Part 4 of hopefully 18 of a series titled Failed Abstractions: Interfaces Gone Wild. Parsing is usually introduced as a tidy recognition solution: given an input and a grammar, the parser must decide whether the input belongs to the language described by the grammar. Simple enough. And if it does, the parser builds a syntactic structure that the rest of the system ‘downstream’ employs. That summary is semi-useful. It serves as a…
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This is Part 3 of a series titled Failed Abstractions: Interfaces Gone Wild.
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This is Part 2 of a series titled Failed Abstractions: Interfaces Gone Wild.
… Any proposed alternative must specify a goal different from the average goal of the current abstractive framework. Unfortunately, there appears to be an abundance of goals in varying opposition in the software ecosystem. In fact, the further the abstractive process is undertaken, the more divergent the seeming goals. …
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A proposed set of eighteen articles examining the oft-overlooked failures of translation, the way they create drifts in terms of semantic authority, and the prospects for accountable extension.