Lecture Notes: Theory (and Practice) of Programming Languages

COMP 371/471 | Department of Computer Science | Loyola University Chicago

You have reached the home of the Programming Languages course (COMP 371/471) in the Computer Science Department of Loyola University Chicago.

Welcome! Willkumme! ¡Bienvenidos/as! Benvenuti/e!

Warning

These notes are still being written, so expect a few rough edges. But we’re getting closer!

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Contents

Todo

Ensure proper structural mapping from Sphinx to LaTeX

• 1. Overview
  • 1.1. Course Information
  • 1.2. Motivation
  • 1.3. Key learning outcomes
  • 1.4. Some starting points for functional programming
  • 1.5. Course outline
  • 1.6. Bloom’s taxonomy
• 2. Context and Background
  • 2.1. Software requirements
  • 2.2. Overview of a lightweight development process
  • 2.3. Software design principles and patterns
  • 2.4. Programming language history and paradigms
  • 2.5. Popularity indices and performance comparisons
• 3. The Imperative Programming Paradigm
  • 3.1. Options for running Scala code
  • 3.2. Techniques for testing Scala code
  • 3.3. The role of command-line applications
  • 3.4. The role of logging
  • 3.5. The importance of constant-space complexity
  • 3.6. Making command-line applications testable
• 4. The Object-Oriented Programming Paradigm
  • 4.1. Making command-line applications testable
  • 4.2. Defining domain models in object-oriented languages
  • 4.3. Object-oriented Scala as a “better Java”
  • 4.4. Modularity and dependency injection
• 5. The Functional Programming Paradigm
  • 5.1. Solving problems using built-in types and behaviors
  • 5.2. Defining algebraic data types
  • 5.3. Behaviors on algebraic data types
  • 5.4. A closer look at predefined behaviors on lists
  • 5.5. Separation of concerns at the type level
  • 5.6. Other useful abstractions
  • 5.7. References
• 6. Program Representation and Interpretation
  • 6.1. Programming language toolchains
  • 6.2. Compiler front-end concepts and techniques
  • 6.3. Programming language semantics
  • 6.4. Case study: a simple imperative language
  • 6.5. Case study: a simple imperative language with records
  • 6.6. Type systems
  • 6.7. Domain-specific languages
• 7. The Concurrent Programming Paradigm
  • 7.1. Overview
  • 7.2. Activity terminology and concerns
  • 7.3. Thread safety
  • 7.4. Dealing with shared state
  • 7.5. (Conflicting) design forces
  • 7.6. Specific concurrency mechanisms
  • 7.7. References: concurrent and asynchronous computing
• 8. Summary
• 9. Appendix: Programming Language Design Principles
• 10. Appendix: Resources
  • 10.1. Key resources
  • 10.2. Code examples
  • 10.3. Recommended/supplementary texts
  • 10.4. Additional texts on Scala
  • 10.5. Online Scala resources
  • 10.6. Resources on program representation and interpretation
  • 10.7. Other resources
• 11. Appendix: Course Software
  • 11.1. Cloud-based development environment
  • 11.2. Locally installed development environment
  • 11.3. sbt optional plugins
  • 11.4. GitHub
  • 11.5. Remote participation
• 12. Appendix: Course Syllabi
  • 12.1. Course: COMP 371/471 Programming Languages
  • 12.2. Section: 001 Fall 2025
  • 12.3. Section: 001 Fall 2024
  • 12.4. Section: 001 Fall 2023
  • 12.5. Section: 001 Fall 2022
  • 12.6. Section: 001 Fall 2021
  • 12.7. Sections: 001/002 Fall 2020
  • 12.8. Section: 001 Fall 2019
  • 12.9. Section: 001 Fall 2018
  • 12.10. Section: 001 Spring 2018
  • 12.11. Section: 001 Spring 2017
  • 12.12. Detailed Course Outline
  • 12.13. Key Resources
• 13. Appendix: TODO

Indices and tables

• Index

• Search Page

Todo

add sample projects, activities, tests, and (tiered) master list for presentations

Todo

add stuff from https://trello.com/c/kAMGZ4uf/28-add-in-next-iteration