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book announcement--Bruce



Readers of the Types Forum might be interested in this book.  For more
information, please visit  http://mitpress.mit.edu/026202523X/


Foundations of Object-Oriented Languages
Types and Semantics
Kim B. Bruce

In recent years, object-oriented programming has emerged as the dominant 
computer programming style, and object-oriented languages such as C++ and 
Java enjoy wide use in academia and industry. This text explores the formal 
underpinnings of object-oriented languages to help the reader understand the 
fundamental concepts of these languages and the design decisions behind them.

The text begins by analyzing existing object-oriented languages, paying 
special attention to their type systems and impediments to expressiveness. It 
then examines two key features: subtypes and subclasses. After a brief 
introduction to the lambda calculus, it presents a prototypical 
object-oriented language, SOOL, with a simple type system similar to those of 
class-based object-oriented languages in common use. The text offers proof 
that the type system is sound by showing that the semantics preserves typing 
information. It concludes with a discussion of desirable features, such as 
parametric polymorphism and a MyType construct, that are not yet included in 
most statically typed object-oriented languages.

Kim B. Bruce is Frederick Latimer Wells Professor of Computer Science at 
Williams College.

8 x 9, 376 pp., 100 illus, cloth, ISBN 0-262-02523-X

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