Term Rewriting Systems play an important role in various areas, such as abstract data type specifications, implementations of functional programming languages and automated deduction. In this chapter we introduce several of the basic comcepts and facts for TRS's. Specifically, we discuss Abstract Reduction Systems

The λσ-calculus is a refinement of the λ-calculus where substitutions are manipulated explicitly. The λσ-calculus provides a setting for studying the theory of substitutions, with pleasant mathematical properties. It is also a useful bridge between the classical λ-calculus and concrete implementations.

Within the context of an algebraic theory of processes, an equational specification of process cooperation is provided. Four cases are considered: free merge or interleaving, merging with communication, merging with mutual exclusion of tight regions, and synchronous process cooperation. The rewrite system behind the communication algebra is shown to be confluent and terminating (modulo its permutative reductions). Further, some relationships are shown to hold between the four concepts of merging. © 1984 Academic Press, Inc.

ion is said to bind the free variable x in M . E.g. we say that x:yx has x as bound and y as free variable. Substitution [x := N ] is only performed in the free occurrences of x: yx(x:x)[x := N ] yN(x:x): In calculus there is a similar variable binding. In R b a f(x; y)dx the variable x is bound and y is free. It does not make sense to substitute 7 for x: R b a f(7; y)d7; but substitution for y makes sense: R b a f(x; 7)dx. For reasons of hygiene it will always be assumed that the bound variables that occur in a certain expression are dierent from the free ones. This can be fullled by renaming bound variables. E.g. x:x becomes y:y. Indeed, these expressions act the same way: (x:x)a = a = (y:y)a and in fact they denote the same intended algorithm. Therefore expressions that dier only in the names of bound variables are identied. 8 Introduction to Lambda Calculus Functions of more arguments Functions of several arguments can be obtained by iteration of applica...

A new typed, higher-order logic is described which appears particularly well fitted to reasoning about forms of computation whose operational behaviour can be specified using the Natural Semantics style of structural operational semantics [5]. The logic's underlying type system is Moggi's computational metalanguage [11], which enforces a distinction between computations and values via the categorical structure of a strong monad. This is extended to a (constructive) predicate logic with modal formulas about evaluation of computations to values, called evaluation modalities. The categorical structure corresponding to this kind of logic is explained and a couple of examples of categorical models given. As a first example of the naturalness and applicability of this new logic to program semantics, we investigate the translation of a (tiny) fragment of Standard ML into a theory over the logic, which is proved computationally adequate for ML's Natural Semantics [10]. Whilst it is tiny, the M...

Combinatory Reduction Systems, or CRSs for short, were designed to combine the usual first-order format of term rewriting with the presence of bound variables as in pure -calculus and various typed -calculi. Bound variables are also present in many other rewrite systems, such as systems with simplification rules for proof normalization. The original idea of CRSs is due to Aczel, who introduced a restricted class of CRSs and, under the assumption of orthogonality, proved confluence. Orthogonality means that the rules are non-ambiguous (no overlap leading to a critical pair) and left-linear (no global comparison of terms necessary). We introduce the class of orthogonal CRSs, illustrated with many examples, discuss its expressive power, and give an outline of a short proof of confluence. This proof is a direct generalization of Aczel's original proof, which is close to the well-known confluence proof for -calculus by Tait and Martin-Lof. There is a well-known connection between the para...

We present a higher-order calculus ECC which can be seen as an extension of the calculus of constructions [CH88] by adding strong sum types and a fully cumulative type hierarchy. ECC turns out to be rather expressive so that mathematical theories can be abstractly described and abstract mathematics may be adequately formalized. It is shown that ECC is strongly normalizing and has other nice proof-theoretic properties. An !\GammaSet (realizability) model is described to show how the essential properties of the calculus can be captured set-theoretically.

Functional logic languages with a sound and complete operational semantics are mainly based on narrowing. Due to the huge search space of simple narrowing, steadily improved narrowing strategies have been developed in the past. Needed narrowing is currently the best narrowing strategy for first-order functional logic programs due to its optimality properties w.r.t. the length of derivations and the number of computed solutions. In this paper, we extend the needed narrowing strategy to higher-order functions and λ-terms as data structures. By the use of definitional trees, our strategy computes only incomparable solutions. Thus, it is the first calculus for higher-order functional logic programming which provides for such an optimality result. Since we allow higher-order logical variables denoting λ-terms, applications go beyond current functional and logic programming languages.

We present an equational framework for term graph rewriting with cycles. The usual notion of homomorphism is phrased in terms of the notion of bisimulation, which is well-known in process algebra and concurrency theory. Specifically, a homomorphism is a functional bisimulation. We prove that the bisimilarity class of a term graph, partially ordered by functional bisimulation, is a complete lattice. It is shown how Equational Logic induces a notion of copying and substitution on term graphs, or systems of recursion equations, and also suggests the introduction of hidden or nameless nodes in a term graph. Hidden nodes can be used only once. The general framework of term graphs with copying is compared with the more restricted copying facilities embodied in the µ-rule, and translations are given between term graphs and µ-expressions. Using these, a proof system is given for µ-expressions that is complete for the semantics given by infinite tree unwinding. Next, orthogonal term graph rewrite ...

We address the problem of dependency analysis and caching in the context of the -calculus. The dependencies of a - term are (roughly) the parts of the -term that contribute to the result of evaluating it. We introduce a mechanism for keeping track of dependencies, and discuss how to use these dependencies in caching.