Programming languages is a central and fundamental topic in computer science which concerns all aspects to do with programming. The research in the programming language group includes research into particular programming languages, fundamental research such as type systems, program analysis and verification of software, paradigms of programming, and aspects arising from concurrent, parallel and distributed programing. There is also overlap with software engineering - work in formal methods is described in the software engineering portion of this report.

The research can be classified along the following dimensions:

• Theoretical Foundations: models of concurrency, semantics and logics of programming languages, etc.
• Functional Programming: extension of type systems, enhancing functional programming languages, etc.
• Constraint Programming: constraint logic programming (CLP), algorithms for Constraint Satisfaction Problems (CSP), scheduling and timetabling algorithms, constraint solving frameworks and systems, etc.
• Program Analysis and Transformations: abstract interpretation, reasoning about programs and partial evaluation.
• Formal Methods: verification, model checking and theorem proving
• Dependable Software: detection of software vulnerabilities, systematic construction of dependable software, specification mining
• Programming paradigms: Principles and Practice of Aspect Oriented Programming
• Applications of Programming Paradigms: applications of constraint programming to real-life combinatorial problems such as sports scheduling, rostering, resource allocation, etc.
• Programming for Web 2.0

Selected Publications

Verification and Program Analysis:

• W-N, Chin, H,H, Nguyen, S.Qin, M. Rinard, Memory Usage Verification for OO Programs, Intl. Symposium on Static Analysis (SAS), 2005.
• W-N. Chin, S-C. Khoo, S. Qin, C. Popeea, H.H. Nguyen, Verifying Safety Policies with Size Properties and Alias Controls, ACM International Conf. on Software Engineering (ICSE), 2005.
• J. Jaffar, A.E. Santosa and R. Voicu, A CLP Method for Compositional and Intermittent Predicate Abstraction, Intl. Conf. on Verification, Model Checking and Abstract Interpretation (VMCAI), 2006.
• J. Jaffar, A.E. Santosa and R. Voicu, Relative Safety, Intl. Conf. on Verification, Model Checking and Abstract Interpretation (VMCAI), 2006.
• T.Q. Huynh and A. Roychoudhury, A Memory Model Sensitive Checker for C\#, Intl. Symp. on Formal Methods (FM), 2006.

Type systems:

• W-N. Chin, F. Craciun, S-C. Khoo, C. Popeea, A Flow-Based Approach for Variant Parametric Types, ACM SIGPLAN Conf. on Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages, and Applications (OOPSLA), 2006.
• M. Sulzmann, G. J. Duck, S. Peyton Jones and P. J. Stuckey, Understanding functional dependencies via constraint handling rules, Journal of Functional Programming, 17(1), 2007.
• M. Sulzmann, M. M. T. Chakravarty, S. Peyton Jones and K. Donnelly, System F with type equality coercions, ACM SIGPLAN Workshop on Types in Language Design and Implementation (TLDI), 2007.
• M. Sulzmann, T. Schrijvers and P. J. Stuckey. Principal type inference for GHC-style multi-parameter type classes, ASIAN Symp. on Programming Languages and Systems (APLAS), 2006.
• M. Sulzmann, Extracting programs from type class proofs, In Proc. of ACM-SIGPLAN International Symp. on Principle and Practice of Declarative Programming (PPDP), 2006.

Constraint programming:

• S. Halim, R.H.C. Yap and H.C. Lau, Viz: A Visual Analysis Suite for Explaining Local Search Behavior, ACM Symposium on User Interface Software and Technology (UIST), 2006
• S. Brand and R.H.C. Yap, Propagation = Logic + Control, Intl. Conf. on Logic Programming (ICLP), 2006
• K.C.K. Cheng and R.H.C. Yap, Maintaining Generalized Arc Consistency on Ad-hoc $n$-ary Boolean Constraints, European Conf. on Artificial Intelligence (ECAI), 2006
• Y. Zhang and R. H. C. Yap, Set Intersection and Consistency in Constraint Networks, Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research, 27, 2006.
• K.C.K. Cheng and R.H.C. Yap, Applying Ad-hoc Global Constraints with the case Constraint to Still-Life, Constraints, 11(2--3), 2006

Faculty Members

• Chin Wei Ngan
• Martin Henz
• Joxan Jaffar
• Khoo Siau Cheng
• Abhik Roychoudhury
• Martin Sulzmann
• Razvan Voicu
• Roland Yap

See also the Software Engineering area for related faculty members.

Student Members (Incomplete)

• Asavoae Mihail
• Asavoae Irina Mariuca
• Kenil C. K. Cheng
• Florin Craciun
• Guo Liang
• Kenny Lu Zhuo Ming
• Popeea Corneliu Christian
• Nguyen Huu Hai
• Andrew E. Santosa
• Sufatrio
• Zhu Ping