yall.pl -- Lambda expressionsyall.pl -- Lambda expressionsProlog realizes high-order programming with meta-calling. The core predicate of this is call/1, which simply calls its argument. This can be used to define higher-order predicates such as ignore/1 or forall/2. The call/N construct calls a closure with N-1 additional arguments. This is used to define higher-order predicates such as the maplist/2-5 family or foldl/4-7.
The closure concept used here is somewhat different from the closure
concept from functional programming. The latter is a function that is
always evaluated in the context that existed at function creation time.
Here, a closure is a term of arity 0 =< L =< K. The term's functor is
the name of a predicate of arity K and the term's L arguments (where
L could be 0) correspond to L leftmost arguments of said predicate,
bound to parameter values. For example, a closure involving
atom_concat/3 might be the term atom_concat(prefix). In order of
increasing L, one would have increasingly more complete closures that
could be passed to call/3, all giving the same result:
call(atom_concat,prefix,suffix,R). call(atom_concat(prefix),suffix,R). call(atom_concat(prefix,suffix),R). call(atom_concat(prefix,suffix,R)).
The problem with higher order predicates based on call/N is that the
additional arguments are always added to the end of the closure's
argument list. This often requires defining trivial helper predicates to
get the argument order right. For example, if you want to add a common
postfix to a list of atoms you need to apply
atom_concat(In,Postfix,Out), but
maplist(atom_concat(Postfix),ListIn,ListOut) calls
atom_concat(Postfix,In,Out). This is where library(yall) comes in, where
the module name, yall, stands for Yet Another Lambda Library.
The library allows us to write a lambda expression that wraps around the (possibly complex) goal to call:
?- maplist([In,Out]>>atom_concat(In,'_p',Out), [a,b], ListOut). ListOut = [a_p, b_p].
A bracy list {...} specifies which variables are shared between the
wrapped goal and the surrounding context. This allows us to write the
code below. Without the {Postfix} a fresh variable would be passed to
atom_concat/3.
add_postfix(Postfix, ListIn, ListOut) :-
maplist({Postfix}/[In,Out]>>atom_concat(In,Postfix,Out),
ListIn, ListOut).
This introduces the second application area of lambda expressions: the
ability to confine variables to the called goal's context. This features
shines when combined with bagof/3 or setof/3 where one normally has to
list those variables whose bindings one is not interested in using the
Var^Goal construct (marking Var as existentially quantified and
confining it to the called goal's context). Lambda expressions allow you
to do the converse: specify the variables which one is interested in.
These variables are common to the context of the called goal and the
surrounding context.
Lambda expressions use the syntax below
{...}/[...]>>Goal.
The {...} optional part is used for lambda-free variables (the ones
shared between contexts). The order of variables doesn't matter, hence
the {...} set notation.
The [...] optional part lists lambda parameters. Here, order of
variables matters, hence the list notation.
As / and >> are standard infix operators, no new operators are added
by this library. An advantage of this syntax is that we can simply unify
a lambda expression with {Free}/[Parameters]>>Lambda to access each of
its components. Spaces in the lambda expression are not a problem
although the goal may need to be written between '()'s. Goals that are
qualified by a module prefix also need to be wrapped inside parentheses.
Combined with library(apply_macros), library(yall) allows writing one-liners for many list operations that have the same performance as hand-written code.
This module implements Logtalk's lambda expressions syntax.
The development of this module was sponsored by Kyndi, Inc.
+Parameters >> +Lambda >>(+Parameters, +Lambda, ?A1) >>(+Parameters, +Lambda, ?A1, ?A2) >>(+Parameters, +Lambda, ?A1, ?A2, ?A3) >>(+Parameters, +Lambda, ?A1, ?A2, ?A3, ?A4) >>(+Parameters, +Lambda, ?A1, ?A2, ?A3, ?A4, ?A5) >>(+Parameters, +Lambda, ?A1, ?A2, ?A3, ?A4, ?A5, ?A6) >>(+Parameters, +Lambda, ?A1, ?A2, ?A3, ?A4, ?A5, ?A6, ?A7)call(Lambda,A1,...),
but arguments are reordered according to the list Parameters:
length(Parameters) arguments from A1, ... are
unified with (a copy of) Parameters, which may share
them with variables in Lambda. +Free / :Lambda /(+Free, :Lambda, ?A1) /(+Free, :Lambda, ?A1, ?A2) /(+Free, :Lambda, ?A1, ?A2, ?A3) /(+Free, :Lambda, ?A1, ?A2, ?A3, ?A4) /(+Free, :Lambda, ?A1, ?A2, ?A3, ?A4, ?A5) /(+Free, :Lambda, ?A1, ?A2, ?A3, ?A4, ?A5, ?A6) /(+Free, :Lambda, ?A1, ?A2, ?A3, ?A4, ?A5, ?A6, ?A7)Free/[]>>Lambda. This is the same as applying
call/N on Lambda, except that only variables appearing in Free
are bound by the call. For example
p(1,a).
p(2,b).
?- {X}/p(X,Y).
X = 1;
X = 2.
This can in particularly be combined with bagof/3 and setof/3 to select particular variables to be concerned rather than using existential quantification (^/2) to exclude variables. For example, the two calls below are equivalent.
setof(X, Y^p(X,Y), Xs)
setof(X, {X}/p(X,_), Xs)
unify_lambda_parameters(+ParmsAndFree, +Args, -CallArgs, +Lambda, -LambdaCopy) is det[private] expand_lambda(+Goal, -Head) is semidet[private] is_lambda(@Term) is semidet lambda_calls(+LambdaExpression, -Goal) is det lambda_calls(+LambdaExpression, +ExtraArgs, -Goal) is det