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A Core Calculus for Scala Type Checking

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First-class function

In computer science, a programming language is said to have first-class functions if it treats functions as first-class citizens. This means the language supports passing functions as arguments to other functions, returning them as the values from other functions, and assigning them to variables or storing them in data structures. Some programming language theorists require support for anonymous functions (function literals) as well.

Assignment (computer science)

In computer programming, an assignment statement sets and/or re-sets the value stored in the storage location(s) denoted by a variable name; in other words, it copies a value into the variable. In most imperative programming languages, the assignment statement (or expression) is a fundamental construct. Today, the most commonly used notation for this operation is x = expr (originally Superplan 1949–51, popularized by Fortran 1957 and C). The second most commonly used notation is x := expr (originally ALGOL 1958, popularised by Pascal).

Nullable type

Nullable types are a feature of some programming languages which allow a value to be set to the special value NULL instead of the usual possible values of the data type. In statically typed languages, a nullable type is an option type, while in dynamically typed languages (where values have types, but variables do not), equivalent behavior is provided by having a single null value. NULL is frequently used to represent a missing value or invalid value, such as from a function that failed to return or a missing field in a database, as in NULL in SQL.

Multiple inheritance

Multiple inheritance is a feature of some object-oriented computer programming languages in which an object or class can inherit features from more than one parent object or parent class. It is distinct from single inheritance, where an object or class may only inherit from one particular object or class. Multiple inheritance has been a controversial issue for many years, with opponents pointing to its increased complexity and ambiguity in situations such as the "diamond problem", where it may be ambiguous as to which parent class a particular feature is inherited from if more than one parent class implements said feature.

Covariance and contravariance (computer science)

Many programming language type systems support subtyping. For instance, if the type is a subtype of , then an expression of type should be substitutable wherever an expression of type is used. Variance is how subtyping between more complex types relates to subtyping between their components. For example, how should a list of s relate to a list of s? Or how should a function that returns relate to a function that returns ? Depending on the variance of the type constructor, the subtyping relation of the simple types may be either preserved, reversed, or ignored for the respective complex types.

Tagged union

In computer science, a tagged union, also called a variant, variant record, choice type, discriminated union, disjoint union, sum type or coproduct, is a data structure used to hold a value that could take on several different, but fixed, types. Only one of the types can be in use at any one time, and a tag field explicitly indicates which one is in use. It can be thought of as a type that has several "cases", each of which should be handled correctly when that type is manipulated.

Type conversion

In computer science, type conversion, type casting, type coercion, and type juggling are different ways of changing an expression from one data type to another. An example would be the conversion of an integer value into a floating point value or its textual representation as a string, and vice versa. Type conversions can take advantage of certain features of type hierarchies or data representations.

Abstract type

In programming languages, an abstract type is a type in a nominative type system that cannot be instantiated directly; a type that is not abstract – which can be instantiated – is called a concrete type. Every instance of an abstract type is an instance of some concrete subtype. Abstract types are also known as existential types. An abstract type may provide no implementation, or an incomplete implementation. In some languages, abstract types with no implementation (rather than an incomplete implementation) are known as protocols, interfaces, signatures, or class types.

Trait (computer programming)

In computer programming, a trait is a concept used in programming languages which represents a set of methods that can be used to extend the functionality of a class. In object-oriented programming, behavior is sometimes shared between classes which are not related to each other. For example, many unrelated classes may have methods to serialize objects to JSON. Historically, there have been several approaches to solve this without duplicating the code in every class needing the behavior.

Class (computer programming)

In object-oriented programming, a class is an extensible program-code-template for creating objects, providing initial values for state (member variables) and implementations of behavior (member functions or methods). In many languages, the class name is used as the name for the class (the template itself), the name for the default constructor of the class (a subroutine that creates objects), and as the type of objects generated by instantiating the class; these distinct concepts are easily conflated.