Engines build process abstractions

ABSTRACT

Engines are a new programming language abstraction for timed preemption. In conjunction with first class continuations, engines allow the language to be extended with a time-sharing implementation of process abstraction facilities. To illustrate engine programming techniques, we implement a round-robin process scheduler. The importance of simple but powerful primitives such as engines is discussed.

References

1. 1.Filman, R., and Friedman, D. P. Coordinated Computing: Tools and Techniques for Distributed Software, McGraw-Hill, 1984.
2. 2.Friedman, D.P., Haynes, C.T., Kohlbecker, E., and Wand, M. "The Scheme 84 Reference Manual" Indiana University Computer Science Department Technical Report No. 153 (March, 1984).
3. 3.Morris, J., "Protection in Programming Languages," CACM16, 1973, pages 15-21.
4. 4.Steele, G., Woods, D., Finkel, R., Crispin, M., Stallman, R., and Goodfellow, G., The Hacker's Dictionary, Harper & Row, 1983.
5. 5.Wand, M. "Continuation-based multiprocessing," Conf. Record of the 1980 Lisp Conference, August 1980, pages 19-28.

Index Terms

• Computing methodologies

  • Concurrent computing methodologies

    • Concurrent programming languages

• Software and its engineering

  • Software creation and management

    • Software development techniques

  • Software notations and tools

    • General programming languages

      • Language types

        • Concurrent programming languages

  • Software organization and properties

    • Contextual software domains

      • Operating systems

        • Process management