The C Standards process over the last few decades has addressed both optimization and pointer type safety largely through a concept called “undefined behavior”. The idea is that instead of positive rules for what compilers and programmers can do, the
Dennis Ritchie on alias analysis in the C programming language 1988
This 1998 note by Dennis Ritchie from comp.lang.c (and also here ) is very current since the concept of noalias has definitely crept back into the standard. I have reproduced it verbatim, but lightly formatted for readability. For further reading
C89 Standard
A text version of a non-final draft is below. Here’s the pdf of the final version. (This foreword is not a part of American National Standard for Information Systems — Programming Language C, X3.???-1988.) American National Standard Programming Language C
Sorting algorithms as recursive functions
This paper is an experiment in presenting programming algorithms as recursive functions, without pseudo-code or genuine code. The algorithms presented are the standard basic sorting algorithms with some computational complexity analysis. The style is that of ordinary working mathematics although
Paxos demystified
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The halting problem has nothing to do with computers
“Turing’s work was of course a great contribution to the world of mathematics, but there is a question of exactly how it is related to the world of computing. – Wilkes The undecidability of the halting problem for Turing
Semiotics of functional programming
In contrast to the usual imperative languages (e.g., C, Fortran, and Ada), in which variables represent cells in memory that can be modified using the assignment operator = (or :=), functional languages view the use of the = operator as
Von Neumann’s critique of automata theory and logic in computer science
These remarks from “THE GENERAL AND LOGICAL THEORY OF AUTOMATA” 1947 are, not surprisingly, enormously insightful. Von Neumann essentially predicts the emergence of the field of analysis of algorithms and algorithmic complexity. Not only does he point out the importance
Spanner in the works
The developers of Google’s Spanner database built an interesting system but chose to build their own clock synchronization technology instead of getting a more precise off the shelf solution and chose to make extensive use of the notoriously complex Paxos
Comrades Cheyne and Stokes and mathematics
There is a great book of stories by Soviet era radio astronomer Iosef Shklovsky called 5 Billion Vodka Bottles to the Moon which has a this story (which I tell from memory, no guarantees) In 1953 a young Jewish math