[stack] Re: How the Interpreter Works

>  > I know a bit about compilers/interpreters and it's not clear
>  > why I would want to analyse another one. I was hoping that
>  > 'concatinative methods' would lead towards a formal
>  > [mathematical like] way of anlysing algorithms and/or
>  > proving code correctness. Does it ?

Christopher Diggins wrote;
>  In general the concatenative approach greatly simplifies reasoning
> about algorithms and code. It also simplifies automated translation,
> analysis, compilation, and optimization. Check out Manfred von Thun's
>  writing about algebraic manipulation of concatenative code
>( http://www.latrobe.edu.au/philosophy/phimvt/joy/j04alg.html ).
>It is common for most compilers to reduce code to a point-free form
>  (e.g. nameless) before conducting further analysis, which I think
>  testifies to the usefulness of point-free forms (concatenative or
>  otherwise). The fact that call-by-push-value semantics
> ( http://citeseer.ist.psu.edu/234600.html )
> subsumes call by name and  call by value semantics may also
> indicate that stack-based approaches  are perhaps a more
> general formalism than either of them.

As previously stated I'm aware of Backus' and McCarthy's
promotions of functional programming for facilitating formal methods
of correctness proof.  But that's decades ago, and I've never seen that
anything usable came of it.  It reminds me of these blokes that spend
every weekend polishing their vehicles, but have never made a 'journey'!

The first part of joy/j04alg.html looks like interesting manipulations,
but no indication for me that it will achieve 'formal methods'.

What I need to see is a 'hello world', as a proof of concept.
My related rant below, hopefully further explains why I'm reluctant to
start a journey which won't reach a profitable destination.

Thanks,

== Chris Glur.

PS. rant will be enlarged in later post.
WebBased gmail is difficult to manage ?
And spammers drove me from normal mailer.