Higher-Order and Symbolic Computation, 11(4)355-361

Definitional Interpreters Revisited

John C. Reynolds, School of Computer Science, Carnegie Mellon University

Abstract: To introduce the republication of "Definitional Interpreters for Higher-Order Programming Languages", the author recounts the circumstances of its creation, clarifies several obscurities, corrects a few mistakes, and briefly summarizes some more recent developments.

Keywords: operational semantics, denotational semantics, interpreter, lambda calculus, applicative language, functional language, metacircularity, higher-order function, defunctionalization, closure, call by value, call by name, continuation, continuation-passing-style transformation, LISP, ISWIM, PAL, Scheme, SECD machine, J-operator, escape, assignment

This article can be downloaded [here] or locally [here]. 		[picture of journal cover]

April 2004 - hosc@brics.dk