CMSC 631 PROGRAM ANALYSIS AND UNDERSTANDING



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Catalog Description

Techniques for static analysis of source code and modern programming paradigms. Analysis techniques: data flow analysis, program dependence graphs, program slicing, abstract interpretation. The meaning of programs: denotational semantics, partial evaluation. Abstraction mechanisms: polymorphic types, operation overloading, inheritance, object-oriented programming and ML-like programming languages.

Prerequisites

CMSC 430 or equivalent.

Topics

Introduction and Overview of Programming Languages (2 weeks)
Language features (5 weeks)
- Location, reference and expressions
- Types
  Kinds of types, type equivalence, polymorphism and overloading, type inference
- Encapsulation
- Inheritance
- Exceptions
Dependences (3.5 weeks)
- Def-Use chains
- Static Single Assignment
- Control Dependence (Dominators)
- Program Dependence Graph
Selected topics (4.5 weeks), possibly including:
- Lambda calculus
- Denotational Semantics
- Abstract Interpretation
- Alias Analysis, including pointers and arrays
- Partial evaluation
- Program slicing

Course Text

Ryan Stansifer, The Study of Programming Languages, Prentice Hall, 1995, ISBN 0-13-726936-6
Selected papers from the research literature

Typical Grading and Workload

30% - Homeworks
30% - Midterm exam
40% - Final