CFP: PPDP'99 Workshop on Declarative Programming with Sets

[Gianfranco Rossi]

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                          CALL FOR PAPERS
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                          PPDP'99 Workshop
                                on
                Declarative Programming with Sets
          (http://www.math.unipr.it/~gianfr/ppdp99.html)
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                           Paris, France
                         September 28, 1999
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(in conjunction with PPDP'99-International Conference on Principles
and Practice of Declarative Programming, part of PLI'99, Paris,
France, 29 Sept. - 1 Oct. 1999 - http://www.dmi.ens.fr/~fages/PPDP99/)
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Scope:
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The use of sets, set operations, and various forms of set-theoretical
constructs in programming and specification languages has attracted
the interest of a number of researchers in the past few years.
Various extensions to incorporate set-based features have been
put forward in the field of imperative languages (e.g., SETL),
functional languages (e.g., Miranda, SEL), (constraint) logic
languages (e.g., LDL, CLPS, {log}, SuRE), as well as in the field of
specification languages (e.g., Z). Also, some proposals have appeared
in the field of visual languages based on sets (e.g., SPARCL).
(see also the WEB pages on Programming with Sets at the URL
http://www.cs.nmsu.edu/~complog/sets).

The new emerging notion of declarative programming can constitute
a common denominator for all these proposals that so far has been
lacking.  Indeed, set constructs and operations are by their own nature
highly declarative entities. They provide a natural and very
abstract way to describe non-deterministic solutions to complex
problems.  Dealing with them as constraints further enhances their
declarativeness.  Suitable set operations and data structures
(e.g., intensional sets, partial-order clauses) may help render
clear and concise formulations to problems involving set collection
and aggregate operations.
This paradigm is intended to be particularly well-suited to solve
problems from graph theory, program analysis, database query, and
problems that involve search in general.

This workshop is aimed at providing an opportunity for discussing
the many different ways in which sets have been dealt with so far,
with a view to establish some common basis for the new paradigm
of declarative programming with sets. The focus of the workshop
will be on showing that set-based programming languages constitute
a true enhancement over traditional paradigms for the solution of all
these problems, encouraging a true declarative style of programming.
In addition, theoretical and implementation issues are of interest
to the workshop, and contributions from the related fields of set
constraint languages and computable set theory are welcome.

Submission Details:
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People interested in giving a talk at the workshop must send an
abstract (4-8 pages) of their proposed contribution by e-mail to
both the organizers. Papers may describe preliminary or partial
results as well as finished research.

Abstracts (in postscript format) are due by June 30, 1999.
Notification of acceptance will be e-mailed by July 30. The final
version of accepted abstracts will be due by August 30.

Accepted contributions will be included in the informal workshop
proceedings, which will be available at the workshop.

Organizing Committee:
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  Bharat Jayaraman
  Department of Computer Science and Engineering
  State University of New York at Buffalo
  e-mail: bharat at cse.Buffalo.EDU
  WEB page: http://www.cse.buffalo.edu/pub/WWW/faculty/bharat

  Gianfranco Rossi
  Dipartimento di Matematica
  Universita' di Parma
  e-mail: gianfr at prmat.math.unipr.it
  WEB page: http://www.math.unipr.it/~gianfr/index.html

Conference Site:
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The workshop will be held in conjunction with PPDP'99 in Paris,
France.  PPDP'99 is part of the colloquium on Principles, Logics,
and Implementations of high-level programming languages (PLI'99).
PPDP aims to stimulate research on the use of declarative methods
in programming and on the design, application and implementation
of programming languages that support such methods.
For general information about attending PPDP'99 and this workshop
(registration, accommodation), please consult:
http://www.dmi.ens.fr/~fages/PPDP99/

The workshop will be one full day and will be open to all
interested people.