Asynchronous Programming in a Prioritized Form

Abstract

Asynchronous programming has appeared as a programming style that overcomes undesired properties of concurrent programming. Typically in asynchronous models of programming, methods are posted into a post list for latter execution. The order of method executions is serial, but nondeterministic. This paper presents a new and simple, yet powerful, model for asynchronous programming. The proposed model consists of two components; a context-free grammar and an operational semantics. The model is supported by the ability to express important applications. An advantage of our model over related work is that the model simplifies the way posted methods are assigned priorities. Another advantage is that the operational semantics uses the simple concept of singly linked list to simulate the prioritized process of methods posting and execution. The simplicity and expressiveness make it relatively easy for analysis algorithms to disclose the otherwise un-captured programming bugs in asynchronous programs.