Abstract
In the functional programming world, it is common to embed a domain specific language (DSL) in a general purpose language. Unfortunately, the extra abstraction layer provided by the DSL is lost when a type error occurs, and internals leak to users of the DSL.
This paper presents specialized type rules, a way to influence which part of the program is blamed and how the particular error message is worded. These type rules match part of the programming language abstract syntax tree (AST) and guide the type checker in order to provide custom diagnostics. Our goal is to enable DSL writers to keep their high-level abstractions throughout the whole development experience. Specialized type rules have already been considered in the literature: we enhance them by providing a mechanism to allow type rules to depend on partial type information.
The technique presented in this paper can be readily applied to any type engine which uses constraints to perform its duty. We refine the workings of the type engine by including a second gathering pass in case an error is found. In that second pass, partial type information can be used to select a type rule. In particular, we have implemented our techniques in a type engine based on the OutsideIn(X) framework, which underlies the Haskell GHC compiler since version 7.
This paper presents specialized type rules, a way to influence which part of the program is blamed and how the particular error message is worded. These type rules match part of the programming language abstract syntax tree (AST) and guide the type checker in order to provide custom diagnostics. Our goal is to enable DSL writers to keep their high-level abstractions throughout the whole development experience. Specialized type rules have already been considered in the literature: we enhance them by providing a mechanism to allow type rules to depend on partial type information.
The technique presented in this paper can be readily applied to any type engine which uses constraints to perform its duty. We refine the workings of the type engine by including a second gathering pass in case an error is found. In that second pass, partial type information can be used to select a type rule. In particular, we have implemented our techniques in a type engine based on the OutsideIn(X) framework, which underlies the Haskell GHC compiler since version 7.
| Original language | English |
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| Title of host publication | Programming Languages and Systems |
| Subtitle of host publication | 25th European Symposium on Programming, ESOP 2016, Held as Part of the European Joint Conferences on Theory and Practice of Software, ETAPS 2016, Eindhoven, The Netherlands, April 2-8, 2016, Proceedings |
| Publisher | Springer |
| Pages | 672-698 |
| Number of pages | 27 |
| ISBN (Electronic) | 978-3-662-49498-1 |
| ISBN (Print) | 978-3-662-49497-4 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 22 Mar 2016 |
Publication series
| Name | Lecture Notes in Computer Science |
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| Volume | 9632 |
| ISSN (Print) | 0302-9743 |