Introducing anonymous predicates into prolog and its implementation

Abstract

Parametric Anonymous Clause (PAC) is introduced into Prolog based on the standard semantics of Prolog, and is implemented on SWI-Prolog. PAC is an extension of ? term. PAC uses the unification of Prolog, and free variables can be passed to PAC. Static PAC is expanded at compile time, so that it runs as efficient as the standard named predicates. Dynamic PAC is interpreted at runtime in a seamless way. The experimental use of PAC shows that PAC significantly enhances expressive power of Prolog. A package of PAC is made for the Prolog library.