433-431 Functional Programming

Credit may not be gained for both 433-431 Functional Programming and 433-631 Functional Programming.

Knowledge of functional programming, and study at the third-year level in at least four of the following areas: artificial intelligence, computer design, database systems, graphics, interactive system design, networks and communications, operating systems, programming languages, software engineering, and theory of computation.

Functional programming is an appealing programming language paradigm that all programmers should be aware of. Functional programming languages are generally simple and powerful and enjoy clean sematics. To learn a functional language, there are few rules to remember, and even fewer exceptions.

Topics covered include functional programming languages: pattern matching, list comprehension, higher-order functions, strict and lazy evaluation; functional programming techniques: accumulators, higher-order programming, continuations, monads; functional data structures and algorithms; declarative input/output; types: polymorphism, type classes; computational models: evaluation of functional programs, lambda calculus, combinators, and graph reduction; implementation: translation to lambda expression and combinator form, abstract machines, strictness analysis, parallel evaluation.

Project work during semester, expected to take about 36 hours (40%) and a 2-hour end of semester written examination (60%).