Paper Info
Title
A theory of changes for higher-order languages: incrementalizing λ-calculi by static differentiation
Abstract
If the result of an expensive computation is invalidated by a small change to the input, the old result should be updated incrementally instead of reexecuting the whole computation. We incrementalize programs through their derivative. A derivative maps changes in the program's input directly to changes in the program's output, without reexecuting the original program. We present a program transformation taking programs to their derivatives, which is fully static and automatic, supports first-class functions, and produces derivatives amenable to standard optimization. We prove the program transformation correct in Agda for a family of simply-typed λ-calculi, parameterized by base types and primitives. A precise interface specifies what is required to incrementalize the chosen primitives. We investigate performance by a case study: We implement in Scala the program transformation, a plugin and improve performance of a nontrivial program by orders of magnitude.
Year
DOI
Venue
2014
10.1145/2594291.2594304
Proceedings of the 35th ACM SIGPLAN Conference on Programming Language Design and Implementation
Keywords
DocType
Volume
whole computation,program transformation,derivative maps change,original program,chosen primitive,nontrivial program,higher-order language,static differentiation,case study,expensive computation,base type,old result,first class functions,performance
Conference
abs/1312.0658
Citations 
PageRank 
References 
15
0.58
14
Authors
4
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Yufei Cai1211.43
Paolo G. Giarrusso22719.97
Tillmann Rendel339216.15
Klaus Ostermann445723.97