[lambda.git] / week9.mdwn

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The seminar is now going to begin talking about more **imperatival** or **effect**-like elements in programming languages. The only effect-like element we've encountered so far is the possibility of divergence, in languages that permit fixed point combinators and so have the full power of recursion. What it means for something to be effect-like, and why this counts as an example of such, will emerge.

Other effect-like elements in a language include: printing (recall the [[damn]] example at the start of term); continuations (also foreshadowed in the [[damn]] example) and exceptions (foreshadowed in our discussion of abortable list traversals in [[week4]]); and **mutation**. This last notion is our topic this week.


## Mutation##

What is mutation? It's helpful to build up to this in a series of fragments. For pedagogical purposes, we'll be using a made-up language that's syntactically similar to, but not quite the same as, OCaml.

Recall from earlier discussions that the following two forms are equivalent:

        [A] let x be EXPRESSION in
                  BODY

                (lambda (x) -> BODY) (EXPRESSION)

This should seem entirely familiar:

        [B] let x be 1 + 2 in
                  let y be 10 in
                        (x + y, x + 20)       ==> (13, 23)

In fragment [B], we bound the variables `x` and `y` to `int`s. We can also bind variables to function values, as here:

        [C] let f be (lambda (x, y) -> x + y + 1) in
                  (f (10, 2), f (20, 2))
                                                                  ==> (13, 23)

If the expression that evaluates to a function value has a free variable in it, like `y` in the next fragment, it's interpreted as bound to whatever value `y` has in the surrounding lexical context:

        [D] let y be 3 in
                  let f be (lambda (x) -> x + y) in
                        (f (10), f (20))
                                                                  ==> (13, 23)

Other choices about how to interpret free variables are also possible (you can read about "lexical scope" versus "dynamic scope"), but what we do here is the norm in functional programming languages, and seems to be easiest for programmers to reason about.

In our next fragment, we re-use a variable that had been bound to another value in a wider context:

        [E] let x be 4 in
                  let x be 3 in
                        (x + 10, x + 20)      ==> (13, 23)

As you can see, the narrowest assignment is what's effective. This is just like in predicate logic: consider <code>&exist;x (Fx and &exist;x Gx)</code>. The computer-science terminology to describe this is that the narrower assignment of `x` to the value 3 **shadows** the wider assignment to 4.

I call attention to this because you might casually describe it as "changing the value that x is assigned to." What we'll go on to see is a more exotic phenomenon that merits that description better.

Sometimes the shadowing is merely temporary, as here:

        [F] let y be 2 in
                  let f be (lambda (x) ->
                        let y be 3 in
                          ; here the most local assignment to y applies
                          x + y
                  ) in
                        ; here the assignment of 3 to y has expired
                        (f (10), y, f (20))   ==> (13, 2, 23)

OK, now we're ready for our main event, **mutable variables.** We'll introduce new syntax to express an operation where we're not shadowing a wider assignment, but *changing* the original assignemnt:

        [G] let y be 2 in
                  let f be (lambda (x) ->
                        change y to 3 then
                          x + y
                  ) in
                        ; here the change in what value y was assigned *sticks*
                        ; because we *updated* the value of the original variable y
                        ; instead of introducing a new y with a narrower scope
                        (f (10), y, f (19))   ==> (13, 3, 23)

In languages that have native syntax for this, there are two styles in which it can be expressed. The *implicit style* is exemplified in fragment [G] above, and also in languages like C:

        {
                int y = 2;    // this is like "let y be 2 in ..."
                ...
                y = 3;        // this is like "change y to 3 then ..."
                return x + y; // this is like "x + y"
        }

A different possibility is the *explicit style* for handling mutation. Here we explicitly create and refer to new "reference cells" to hold our values. When we change a variable's value, the variable stays associated with the same reference cell, but that reference cell's contents get modified. The same thing happens in the semantic machinery underlying implicit-style mutable variables, but there it's implicit. The reference cells aren't themselves explicitly referred to in the object language. In explicit-style mutation, they are. OCaml has explicit-style mutation. It looks like this:

        let ycell = ref 2       (* this creates a new reference cell *)
        ...
        in let () = ycell := 3  (* this changes the contents of that cell to 3; the return value of doing so is () *)
                                                        (* other return values could also be reasonable: such as the old value of ycell, the new value, an arbitrary int, and so on *)
        in x + !ycell;;                 (* the !ycell operation "dereferences" the cell---it retrieves the value it contains *)

Scheme is similar. There are various sorts of reference cells available in Scheme. The one most like OCaml's `ref` is a `box`. Here's how we'd write the same fragment in Scheme:

        (let ([ycell (box 2)])
                ...
                (set-box! ycell 3)
                (+ x (unbox ycell)))

When dealing with explicit-style mutation, there's a difference between the types and values of `ycell` and `!ycell` (or `(unbox ycell)`). The former has the type `int ref`: the variable `ycell` is assigned a reference cell that contains an `int`. The latter has the type `int`, and has whatever value is now stored in the relevant reference cell. In an implicit-style framework though, we only have the resources to refer to the contents of the relevant reference cell. `y` in fragment [G] or the C snippet above has the type `int`, and only ever evaluates to `int` values.


##Controlling order##

When we're dealing with mutable variables (or any other kind of effect), order matters. For example, it would make a big difference whether I evaluated `let z = !ycell` before or after evaluating `ycell := !ycell + 1`. Before this point, order never mattered except sometimes it played a role in avoiding divergence.

OCaml does *not* guarantee what order expressions will be evaluated in arbitrary contexts. For example, in the following fragment, you cannot rely on `expression_a` being evaluated before `expression_b` before `expression_c`:

        let triple = (expression_a, expression_b, expression_c)

OCaml does however guarantee that different let-expressions are evaluated in the order they lexically appear. So in the following fragment, `expression_a` *will* be evaluated before `expression_b` and that before `expression_c`:

        let a = expression_a
                in let b = expression_b
                        in expression_c

Scheme does the same. (*If* you use Scheme's `let*`, but not if you use its `let`. I agree this is annoying.)

If `expression_a` and `expression_b` evaluate to (), for instance if they're something like `ycell := !ycell + 1`, that can also be expressed in OCaml as:

        let () = expression_a
                in let () = expression_b
                        in expression_c

And OCaml has a syntactic shorthand for this form, namely to use semi-colons:

        expression_a; expression_b; expression_c

This is not the same role that semi-colons play in list expressions, like `[1; 2; 3]`. To be parsed correctly, these semi-colon'ed complexes sometimes need to be enclosed in parentheses or a `begin ... end` construction:

        (expression_a; expression_b; expression_c)

        begin expression_a; expression_b; expression_c end

Scheme has a construction similar to the latter:

        (begin (expression_a) (expression_b) (expression_c))

Though often in Scheme, the `(begin ...)` is implicit and doesn't need to be explicitly inserted, as here:

        (lambda (x) (expression_a) (expression_b) (expression_c))

Another way to control evaluation order, you'll recall from [[week6]], is to use **thunks**. These are functions that only take the uninformative `()` as an argument, such as this:

        let f () = ...

or this:

        let f = fun () -> ...

In Scheme these are written as functions that take 0 arguments:

        (lambda () ...)

or:

        (define (f) ...)

How could such functions be useful? Well, as always, the context in which you build a function need not be the same as the one in which you apply it to some arguments. So for example:

        let ycell = ref 1
        in let f () = ycell := !ycell + 1
        in let z = !ycell
        in f ()
        in z;;

We don't apply (or call or execute or however you want to say it) the function `f` until after we've extracted `ycell`'s value and assigned it to `z`. So `z` will get assigned 1. If on the other hand we called `f ()` before evaluating `let z = !ycell`, then `z` would have gotten assigned a different value.

In languages with mutable variables, the free variables in a function definition are usually taken to refer back to the same *reference cells* they had in their lexical contexts, and not just their original value. So if we do this for instance:

        let factory (starting_value : int) =
                let free_var = ref starting_value
                in let getter () =
                        !free_var
                in let setter (new_value : int) =
                        free_var := new_value
                in (getter, setter)
        in let (getter, setter) = factory 1
        in let first = getter ()
        in let () = setter 2
        in let second = getter ()
        in let () = setter 3
        in let third = getter ()
        in (first, second, third)
        
At the end, we'll get `(1, 2, 3)`. The reference cell that gets updated when we call `setter` is the same one that gets fetched from when we call `getter`. This should seem very intuitive here, since we're working with explicit-style mutation. When working with a language with implicit-style mutation, it can be more surprising. For instance, here's the same fragment in Python, which has implicit-style mutation:

        def factory (starting_value):
                free_var = starting_value
                def getter ():
                        return free_var
                def setter (new_value):
                        # the next line indicates that we're using the
                        # free_var from the surrounding function, not
                        # introducing a new local variable with the same name
                        nonlocal free_var
                        free_var = new_value
                return getter, setter
        getter, setter = factory (1)
        first = getter ()
        setter (2)
        second = getter ()
        setter (3)
        third = getter ()
        (first, second, third)

Here, too, just as in the OCaml fragment, all the calls to getter and setter are working with a single mutable variable `free_var`.

If however you called `factory` twice, you'd have different `getter`/`setter` pairs, each of which had their own, independent `free_var`. In OCaml:

        let factory (starting_val : int) =
        ... (* as above *)
        in let (getter, setter) = factory 1
        in let (getter', setter') = factory 1
        in let () = setter 2
        in getter' ()

Here, the call to `setter` only mutated the reference cell associated with the `getter`/`setter` pair. The reference cell associated with `getter'` hasn't changed, and so `getter' ()` will still evaluate to 1.

Notice in these fragments that once we return from inside the call to `factory`, the `free_var` mutable variable is no longer accessible, except through the helper functions `getter` and `setter` that we've provided. This is another way in which a thunk like `getter` can be useful: it still has access to the `free_var` reference cell that was created when it was, because its free variables are interpreted relative to the context in which `getter` was built, even if that context is otherwise no longer accessible. What `getter ()` evaluates to, however, will very much depend on *when* we evaluate it---in particular, it will depend on which calls to the corresponding `setter` were evaluated first.

##Referential opacity##

In addition to order-sensitivity, when you're dealing with mutable variables you also give up a property that computer scientists call "referential transparency." It's not obvious whether they mean exactly the same by that as philosophers and linguists do, or only something approximately the same. What they do mean is a kind of substitution principle, illustrated here:

        let x = 1
                in (x, x)

should evaluate the same as:

        let x = 1
                in (x, 1)

or:

        (1, 1)

Notice, however, that when mutable variables are present, the same substitution patterns can't always be relied on:

        let ycell = ref 1
                in ycell := 2; !ycell
        (* evaluates to 2 *)

        (ref 1) := 2; !(ref 1)
        (* evaluates to 1 *)


##How to implement explicit-style mutable variables##

-- FIXME --

##How to implement implicit-style mutable variables##

-- FIXME --

##How to implicit mutation with a State monad##

-- FIXME --

##Aliasing or Passing by reference##

-- FIXME --

    [H] ; *** aliasing ***
        let y be 2 in
          let x be y in
            let w alias y in
              (y, x, w)           ==> (2, 2, 2)

    [I] ; mutation plus aliasing
        let y be 2 in
          let x be y in
            let w alias y in
              change y to 3 then
                (y, x, w)         ==> (3, 2, 3)

    [J] let f be (lambda (y) -> BODY) in  ; a
          ... f (EXPRESSION) ...

        (lambda (y) -> BODY) EXPRESSION

        let y be EXPRESSION in            ; b
          ... BODY ...

    [K] ; *** passing "by reference" ***
        let f be (lambda (alias w) ->     ; ?
          BODY
        ) in
          ... f (y) ...

        let w alias y in                  ; d
          ... BODY ...

    [L] let f be (lambda (alias w) ->
          change w to 2 then
            w + 2
        ) in
          let y be 1 in
            let z be f (y) in
              ; y is now 2, not 1
              (z, y)              ==> (4, 2)

    [M] ; hyper-evaluativity
        let h be 1 in
          let p be 1 in
            let f be (lambda (alias x, alias y) ->
              ; contrast here: "let z be x + y + 1"
              change y to y + 1 then
                let z be x + y in
                  change y to y - 1 then
                    z
            ) in
              (f (h, p), f (h, h))
                                  ==> (3, 4)

    Notice: h, p have same value (1), but f (h, p) and f (h, h) differ


##Five grades of mutation involvement##

-- FIXME --

    0. Purely functional languages
    1. Passing by reference
       need primitive hyper-evaluative predicates for it to make a difference
    2. mutable variables
    3. mutable values
        - numerically distinct but indiscernible values
        - two equality predicates
        - examples: closures with currently-indiscernible but numerically distinct
          environments, mutable lists
    4. "references" as first-class values
        - x not the same as !x, explicit deref operation
        - can not only be assigned and passed as arguments, also returned (and manipulated?)
        - can be compared for qualitative equality
    5. structured references
        (a) if `a` and `b` are mutable variables that uncoordinatedly refer to numerically the same value
            then mutating `b` won't affect `a` or its value
        (b) if however their value has a mutable field `f`, then mutating `b.f` does
            affect their shared value; will see a difference in what `a.f` now evaluates to


##Miscellany##

*       When using mutable variables, programmers will sometimes write using *loops* that repeatedly mutate a variable, rather than the recursive techniques we've been using so far. For example, we'd define the factorial function like this:

                let rec factorial n =
                        if n = 0 then 1 else n * factorial (n - 1)

        or like this:

                let factorial n =
                        let rec helper n sofar =
                                if n = 0 then sofar else helper (n - 1) (n * sofar)
                        in helper n 1

        (The second version is more efficient than the first; so you may sometimes see this programming style. But for our purposes, these can be regarded as equivalent.)

        When using mutable variables, on the other hand, this may be written as:

                let factorial n =
                        let current = ref n
                        in let total = ref 1
                        in while !current > 0 do
                                total := !total * !current; current := !current - 1
                        done; !total


*       Mutable variables also give us a way to achieve recursion, in a language that doesn't already have it. For example:

                let fact_cell = ref None
                in let factorial n =
                        if n = 0 then 1 else match !fact_cell with
                                | Some fact -> n * fact (n - 1)
                                | None -> failwith "can't happen"
                in let () = fact_cell := Some factorial
                in ...

        We use the `None`/`Some factorial` option type here just as a way to ensure that the contents of fact_cell are of the same type both at the start and the end of the block.


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