[Colloq] Subject: Thesis Proposal - J. Ian Johnson - Wednesday, November 20th, 3:00pm, WVH 366

[Andrew W. Fong]

Subject: Thesis Proposal - J. Ian Johnson - Wednesday, November 20th, 3:00pm, WVH 366

Speaker: J. Ian Johnson
Title: Systematic Constructions for Higher-Order Program Analyses

Date: Wednesday, November 20th, 2013
Time: 3:00pm
Location: 366WVH

Abstract:

Program analysis is ubiquitous, undeniably useful, and unrelentingly complicated. Programming languages with behavioral values (AKA higher-order languages) exacerbate the complexity. The, "wouldn't it be nice if we had an analysis for..." longings of a language power user, designer or amateur implementor are immediately dismissed since analysis is black magic.

In this thesis, I propose simple systematic constructions of precise and performant analyses directly from a language's semantics, for just such an audience.
My dissertation will show that these constructions
1) have simple proofs of correctness, 
2) competitive performance with the black magic,
3) derive known, but complex analyses after fixing parameters,
4) and can be applied to precisely analyze features considered hopeless to analyze precisely.

In this talk, I will talk about the construction of precise "pushdown" analyses and a new application of program analysis to verify temporal properties of higher-order programs.

Proposal webpage: http://www.ccs.neu.edu/home/ianj/thesis-proposal.html

Committee:
    Prof. David Van Horn (Advisor)
    Prof. Olin Shivers (Co-advisor)
    Prof. Mitch Wand
    Prof. Cormac Flanagan, University of Santa Cruz (External Member)


-- 
Andrew W. Fong 
Program Assistant 

Northeastern University 
College of Computer and Information Science 
360 Huntington Avenue 
202 West Village H 
Boston, MA 02115 
617-373-8493 
awfong at ccs.neu.edu