Scheme Macros for Non-linear Pattern Matching with Backtracking for Non-free Data Types

Abstract

Pattern matching is an important feature of programming languages for data abstraction. Many pattern-matching extensions have been proposed and implemented for extending the range of data types to which pattern matching is applicable. Among them, the pattern-matching system proposed by Egi and Nishiwaki features practical pattern matching for non-free data types by providing an extensible non-linear pattern-matching facility with backtracking. However, they implemented their proposal only in an interpreter of the Egison programming language, and a method for compiling pattern-matching expressions of Egison was not discussed. This paper proposes a method for translating a program that contains pattern-matching expressions of Egison to a program that contains only the existing syntax constructs of functional programming languages. This method is based on the three key ideas: (i) transformation of a matcher to a function that takes a pattern and a target, and returns lists of triples of a pattern, a matcher, and a target; (ii) compilation of match-all to application of the map function; (iii) transformation of a value pattern to a function that takes an intermediate pattern-matching result and returns a value. This paper shows the proposed method works by showing Scheme macros that provide the users the pattern-matching facility of Egison. This paper also presents benchmark results that show Egison pattern-matching embedded in Gauche Scheme is faster than the original Egison interpreter.