Methods of Reflection

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Contents 1 Introduction 2 Glossary References 3 Foundations 4 Metalogical Reflection 5 Self-References 6 Run-time Computational Reflection 7 Compile-Time (Computational) Reflection 8 Partial Evaluation 9 Run-Time Code Generation 10 Reflective Expert Systems 11 Reflective Concurrent Programming 12 Meta-Object Protocols 13 Aspect-Oriented Programming 14 Reasoning Systems 15 Reflective Programming Languages

Introduction

Reflection is the ages old concept of someone thinking about oneself. Yes, there are other meanings to the word; this is the one we consider here. In Computer Science, Reflection is a powerful conceptual tool with such various applications as simplifying logical proofs enough to make them physically tractable, enabling dynamic (run-time) evolution of programming systems, transforming programs statically (at compile-time) to add and manage such features as concurrency, distribution, persistence, or object systems, or allowing expert systems to reason about and adapt their own behavior.

Glossary References

• Meta-
• Meta-Circular
• Meta-Level
• Meta-Object
• Meta-Object Protocol
• Metaprogramming
• Open Implementation
• Partial Evaluation
• Reflection
• Reflective Tower
• Reification

Foundations

See Kurt Gödel, Alan Turing, Douglas Hofstadter (see below).

"John Tromp's" universal machine. The Principia Cybernetica project.

Metalogical Reflection

Self-References

Quines

Run-time Computational Reflection

Brian C. Smith, Patti Maes, A. Yonezawa.

Compile-Time (Computational) Reflection

Shigeru Shiba, Tim Sheard, Rowan Davies.

Partial Evaluation

Olivier Danvy & Andrzej Filinski at BRICS; Neil D. Jones at DIKU; Charles Consel and Gilles Muller at IRISA (COMPOSE group); at OGI.

Erik Ruf's PhD thesis on PE. PE courses have been taught using his dissertation.

• Semantics-based Program Analysis and Maipulation
• PEPM'97: Partial Evaluation and Semantic-based Program Manipulation
• cmix
• FUSE

Run-Time Code Generation

Reflective Expert Systems

Jacques Pitrat and his team. Self Reflection in Cognitive Architectures.

Reflective Concurrent Programming

José Meseguer; "Carol Talcott"; A. Yonezawa;

Meta-Object Protocols

A classic book, AMOP.

A recent small project in Squeak by Henrik Gedenryd to develop a "Universal Composition" system for programs. It essentially involves a graph of meta-objects describing source-composition operations which can be eagerly or lazily (statically or dynamically) driven, resulting in partial evaluation or forms of dynamic composition such as AOP. He provides a demonstration Squeak image and a rough draft paper.

Aspect-Oriented Programming

Gregor Kiczales.

See also AspectJ and AspectS.

Reasoning Systems

NuPrl and Maude perhaps?

Reflective Programming Languages

Intel's hardware design language Reflect has some interesting features : see

 http://web.comlab.ox.ac.uk/oucl/work/tom.melham/res/reflect.html