Annotated transformation of SETL existential expressions to C
Jared Bruckner · 1992
This thesis presents research into automatic transformation of very high level SETL programs containing existential expressions to efficient C code. This very difficult problem is divided into three problem groups: problems associated with what transformations to apply and in what order, problems associated with finding a language for requesting the application of chosen transformations as well as providing necessary additional information (annotations), and problems concerning the automatic application of the requested transformation. This thesis describes the research language, SETLIST, the research transformation system, which transforms very high level SETLIST programs containing existential expressions to lower level SETLIST programs, and the compiler, which transforms SETLIST programs to C. Both the transformation system and the compiler utilize annotations. Five families of transformations which use annotations are formally developed and relationships among the families presented. Six case studies are used to show how the five families of transformations are applied to well know computer problems, illustrating how different transformations and different annotations for the same general transformation are used to develop an assortment of lower level algorithms (for a single problem) from the same very high level SETLIST program.