Computer Science 380: Programming Languages

Professor: Dr. Alan Garvey

Section 01: MWF 11:30am-12:20pm VH 1236

Office Hours

• See my schedule.

Note

Textbooks

• Concepts of Programming Languages by Robert W. Sebesta, Addison Wesley, 2015, Eleventh Edition. Ninth and tenth editions are also acceptable.

Syllabus

Papers:

• You will write a short paper and a longer research paper for this course.

Exams:

• There will be two in-class exams, covering material from the textbook. There is no final exam for this course.

Textbook Links:

• Slides for Sebesta Ch. 1 and 2
• Sebesta textbook slides Ch. 3
• Sebesta textbook figures Ch. 3
• Sebesta textbook slides Ch. 4
• Sebesta textbook slides Ch. 5
• Sebesta textbook slides Ch. 6
• Sebesta textbook slides Ch. 7
• Sebesta textbook slides Ch. 8
• Sebesta textbook slides Ch. 9
• param.txt with parameter passing example code
• Sebesta textbook slides Ch. 10
• Sebesta textbook slides Ch. 11
• Sebesta textbook slides Ch. 12
• Sebesta textbook slides Ch. 15

Clojure Links:

• Clojure Programming Cookbook: Handle Every Problem. . . is a good Clojure introduction available as an e-book through Pickler (must be accessed from a Truman IP address).
• Blub Paradox
• Clojure Intro
• Clojure Part 1
• Clojure Koans
• GitHub link for Clojure Koans code
• Clojure repl basic usage guide
• examples.clj Clojure example code from the slides.
• leiningen is the site that I recommend that tells you how to install Clojure for your environment.
• Clojure Part 2
• Absolutely fascinating page explaining how Clojure's persistent vectors work under the hood. This is the first of a series of pages.
• Clojure Part 3
• Clojure Part 4

Other Class-related links:

• ACM Body of Knowledge outcome statements.
• A brief, incomplete and mostly wrong history of programming languages.
• 99-bottles-of-beer.net site that has examples of a program in hundreds (thousands?) of programming languages.
• Specific example programs:
  • FORTRAN-II
  • Clojure (as a LISPish example)
  • COBOL
  • Algol60
  • Basic (in the style of an early version)
  • SmallTalk
  • C++
  • Java
• Smalltalk examples just to give you an idea
• Short article about the usefulness of dynamic typing in Ruby.
• A site devoted to metaprogramming in Ruby.
• Slide presentation about functional programming in Ruby.
• Overview of Smalltalk that we will look at in class.
• The Future of Programming youtube video by Bret Victor
• jmc.lisp the Lisp code from class (Lisp in Lisp)

Lisp-related pointers and stuff:

• An xkcd lisp-related comic
• A Lisp truism
• A quote from Eric Raymond, bigtime Open Source guy:

  Lisp is worth learning for the profound enlightenment experience you will have when you finally get it; that experience will make you a better programmer for the rest of your days, even if you never actually use Lisp itself a lot.

• Revenge of the Nerds is an article by Paul Graham that explains his ideas about what makes Lisp different from other languages.
• The Roots of Lisp is Graham's article about Lisp in Lisp. A link to a pdf of this paper.

Other useful pointers:

• Citation Styles for online documents.
Historic original documents for various programming languages.

Programming Assignments:

• You will have three or four programming assignments in the Clojure programming language.

Homework Assignments:

• There will be three or four homework assignments during the semester.