LambdaCalculus chapter: small-step semantics

frap_book.tex

@@ -1292,7 +1292,7 @@ Define an exponentially growing system of threads ${\mathbb S}^n$ by:
 
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-\chapter{Operational Semantics}
+\chapter{\label{operational_semantics}Operational Semantics}
 
 It gets tedious to define a relation from first principles, to explain the behaviors of any concrete program.
 We do more things with programs than just reason about them.
@@ -1638,7 +1638,7 @@ This new semantics formulation is equivalent to the other two, as we establish n
   By inversion on the derivation of $\smallstepc{(v, c)}{(v', c')}$, followed by an appeal to the last lemma.
 \end{proof}
 
-\subsection{Evaluation Contexts Pay Off: Adding Concurrency}
+\subsection{\label{eval_contexts}Evaluation Contexts Pay Off: Adding Concurrency}
 
 To showcase the convenience of contextual semantics, let's extend our example language with a simple construct for running two commands in parallel\index{parallel composition of threads}, implicitly extending the definition of plugging accordingly.
 $$\begin{array}{rrcl}
@@ -2081,6 +2081,7 @@ Since we aim more for broad than deep coverage of the field of formal program re
 
 With substitution in hand, a big-step semantics\index{big-step semantics} is easy to define.
 We use the syntactic shorthand $v$ for a \emph{value}\index{value}, or term that needs no further evaluation, which in this case includes just the $\lambda$-abstractions.
+\encoding
 $$\infer{\bigstep{\lambda x. \; x}{\lambda x. \; x}}{}
 \quad \infer{\bigstep{e_1 \; e_2}{v'}}{
   \bigstep{e_1}{\lambda x. \; e}
@@ -2181,6 +2182,39 @@ An enjoyable (though not entirely trivial) exercise for the reader is to general
 A hallmark of a Turing-complete language is that it can host an interpreter for itself, and $\lambda$-calculus is no exception!
 
 
+\section{Small-Step Semantics}
+
+$\lambda$-calculus is also straightforward to formalize with a small-step semantics\index{small-step operational semantics} and evaluation contexts\index{evaluation contexts}, following the method of Section \ref{eval_contexts}.
+One might argue that the technique is even simpler for $\lambda$-calculus, since we must deal only with expressions, not also imperative variable valuations.
+
+$$\begin{array}{rrcl}
+  \textrm{Evaluation contexts} & C &::=& \Box \mid C \; e \mid v \; C
+\end{array}$$
+Note the one subtlety: the last form of evaluation context requires the term in a function position to be a \emph{value}.
+This innocuous-looking restriction enforces \emph{call-by-value evaluation order}\index{call-by-value}, where, upon encountering a function application, we must first evaluate the function, then evaluate the argument, and only then call the function.
+Tweaks to the definition of $C$ produce other evaluation orders, like \emph{call-by-name}\index{call-by-name}, but we will say no more about those alternatives.
+
+We assume a standard definition of what it means to plug an expression into the hole in a context, and now we can give the sole small-step evaluation rule for basic $\lambda$-calculus, conventionally called the \emph{$\beta$-reduction} rule\index{$\beta$-reduction}.
+\encoding
+$$\infer{\smallstep{\plug{C}{(\lambda x. \; e) \; v}}{\plug{C}{\subst{e}{x}{v}}}}{}$$
+That is, we find a suitable position within the expression where a $\lambda$-expression is applied to a value, and we replace that position with the appropriate substitution result.
+
+Following a very similar outline to what we used in Chapter \ref{operational_semantics}, we establish equivalence between the two semantics for $\lambda$-calculus.
+
+\begin{theorem}
+  If $\smallsteps{e}{v}$, then $\bigstep{e}{v}$.
+\end{theorem}
+
+\begin{theorem}
+  If $\bigstep{e}{v}$, then $\smallsteps{e}{v}$.
+\end{theorem}
+
+There are a few proof subtleties beyond what we encountered before, and the Coq formalization may be worth reading, to see those details.
+
+Again as before, we have a natural way to build a transition system from any $\lambda$-term $e$, where $\mathcal L$ is the set of $\lambda$-terms.
+We define $\mathbb T(e) = \angled{\mathcal L, \{e\}, \to}$.
+The next section gives probably the most celebrated $\lambda$-calculus result based on the transition-system perspective.
+
 
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