CS2013-final-report

Why do you teach the course this way
My primary goal in the design of this course is to teach “the other 90%”: the population of students who will not
go on to become programming language researchers. My goal is to infect them with linguistic thinking: to
understand that by embodying properties and invariants in their design, languages can solve problems.
Furthermore, most of them, as working developers, will inevitably build languages of their own; I warn them
about classic design mistakes and hope they will learn enough to not make ones of their own.
The course is revised with virtually every offering. Each time we pick one module and try to innovate in the
presentation or learning materials.
Independent student feedback suggests the course is one of the most challenging in the department. Nevertheless,
it does not prevent high enrollments, since students seem to appreciate the linguistic mindset it engenders.
Body of Knowledge coverage
KA Knowledge Unit Topics Covered Hours
PL Object-Oriented Programming Object representations and encodings, types 3
PL Functional Programming All 3
PL Basic Type Systems All 9
PL
Language Translation and
Execution
Interpretation, representations 3
PL Runtime Systems Value layout, garbage collection, manual memory
management
3
PL
Advanced Programming
Constructs
Almost all (varies by year) 6
PL Type Systems All 3
PL Language Pragmatics Almost all (varies by year) 3
PL Logic Programming Relationship to unification and continuations 2
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