Abstract

Several descriptions of basically one transformation technique, viz. accumulation, are compared. Their basis, viz. the associativity and the existence of a neutral element inherent in a monoid, is identified. Keywords transformational programming, factorial, fast reverse, accumulation, continuations, lambda abstraction, generalisation, tail recursion, implementation of lists. This research has been sponsored by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO), under grant NF 63/62-518 (the STOP --- Specification and Transformation Of Programs --- project). 1 Introduction One of the first program transformations that appeared in the literature was the accumulation transformation. The transformation is now classic, although not everyone may know it under exactly this name. In this note, I try to relate several descriptions of this program transformation technique. In a purely algebraic view, it is the exploitation of the properties of a monoid. In literature, it can be fou...

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