[curry] Re: "Normal form" of a partial application

From: Michael Hanus <mh_at_informatik.uni-kiel.de>
Date: Wed, 29 May 2019 18:40:00 +0200

Hi Andy,

this is an interesting issue. Actually, the behavior of PAKCS
was different until I detected a problem with normalizing the
arguments of partial applications when type classes had been added
(where dictionary arguments contained partial applications).

Note that the partial application ((1+1)+) can be rewritten as

    \x -> (1+1) + x

but a lambda term will never be normalized in its body
(otherwise you might run into termination problems).

It is a feature of PAKCS that you can visualize the normal
form of a functional value. In other systems, like KiCS2,
you'll never see them so that this question does not occur.

Best regards,

Michael

On 5/28/19 7:00 PM, Andy Jost wrote:
> I’m trying to understand the following output of PAKCS:
>
>  
>
> test> ((1+1)+)
>
> _impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int (1 _impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int 1)
>
> test> :t (+) (1+1)
>
> (+) (1+1) :: Num a => a -> a
>
>  
>
> It surprises me that the subexpression 1+1 is not reduced.  The full
> expression has no normal form because the first occurrence of + cannot
> be eliminated.  Yet PAKCS seems to treat it as if it was a value.  This
> makes a certain practical sense in the context of the REPL, but if this
> is like a value then why is the subexpression not reduced?
>
>  
>
> If I go one step further and apply $!! to force normalization of the
> partial application, I see that $!! ignores the subexpression 1+1 (trace
> shown):
>
>  
>
> test> id $!! ((1+1)+)
>
> Call: id $!! (_impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int (1
> _impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int 1))
>
> Call: id (_impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int (1
> _impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int 1))
>
> Exit: id (_impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int (1
> _impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int 1)) (HNF:
> _impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int (1 _impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int 1))
>
> Exit: id $!! (_impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int (1
> _impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int 1)) (HNF:
> _impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int (1 _impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int 1))
>
> _impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int (1 _impl#+#Prelude.Num#Prelude.Int 1)
>
>  
>
> This seems to imply that (1+1)+ is a normal form, which it clearly is not.
>
>  
>
> Is this perhaps some corner that is not well defined, or are there good
> reasons to NOT reduce an expression such as ((1+1)+) to (2+)?  I can
> imagine that attaining correct semantics might require this delay if the
> subexpression is non-deterministic but I’m not entirely convinced.
> Certainly, it is not obvious to me.
>
>  
>
> And is there some theoretical basis upon which I can understand these
> seeming quirks?
>
>  
>
> -Andy
>
>
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Received on Mi Mai 29 2019 - 18:48:44 CEST

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