An algebraic semantic framework for object oriented languages with concurrency (extended abstract)

Abstract

This paper presents an algebraic semantics schema for object oriented languages including concurrent features. A class, the basic syntactic unit of an object oriented language, in our approach denotes a set of algebras determined by an algebraic specification. This specification describes a system of (possibly active) objects interacting via method calls. Extending other approaches, structured classes are modelled in a fully compositional way. This means that the semantic counterpart of class combinators such as inheritance and clientship are specification combinators. A model of records with sharing allows us to describe typical object oriented features like object sharing, inheritance polymorphism and dynamic binding. For modelling the dynamic behaviour of objects, we rely on an algebraic description of labelled transition systems.