Lazy type inference for the strictness analysis of lists

Abstract

We present a type inference system for the strictness analysis of fists and we show that it can be used as the basis for an efficient algorithm. The algorithm is as accurate as the usual abstract interpretation technique. One distinctive advantage of this approach is that it is not necessary to impose an abstract domain of a particular depth prior to the analysis: the lazy type algorithm will instead explore the part of a potentially infinite domain required to prove the strictness property.

Strictness and totality analysis

“…We have described an inference system for combining strictness and totality analysis and we have proved the analysis sound with respect to a natural-style operational semantics. A promising approach towards the construction of an inference algorithm for strictness and totality types is to construct an abstract machine as suggested by Hankin and Le Métayer [6,7]. We plan to investigate this in our future work and compare it with constraint based techniques.…”