ICE-TCS Lectures Series - Dr. Claus Brabrand - Banana Algebra

On Monday the 21st of September Dr. Claus Brabrand (University of Copenhagen) will give an ICE-TCS lecture named "Banana Algebra: Syntactic Language Extension via an Algebra of Languages and Transformations". The lecture will held in Kringlan 1 (K-5) at 12-13. 

ABSTRACT

• We propose an algebra of languages and transformations as a means for extending languages syntactically. The algebra provides a layer of high-level abstractions built on top of languages (captured by context-free grammars) and transformations (captured by constructive catamorphisms).
• The algebra is self-contained in that any term of the algebra specifying a transformation can be reduced to a constant catamorphism, before the transformation is run. Thus, the algebra comes "for free" without sacrificing the strong safety and efficiency properties of constructive catamorphisms.
• The entire algebra as presented in the paper is implemented as the Banana Algebra Tool which may be used to syntactically extend languages in an incremental and modular fashion via algebraic composition of previously defined languages and transformations. We demonstrate and evaluate the tool via several kinds of extensions. 

Short Biography:

Dr. Claus Brabrand received his Ph.D. in Computer Science from the BRICS Int'l Research Center and Ph.D. School at Aarhus University, Denmark (Jan. 2003). He is now Associate Professor of Programming, Logic, and Semantics at the IT University of Copenhagen, distributing his time between programming language research, educational research, teaching, and educational development at an institutional level.

Dr. Brabrand has previously worked at Aarhus University; the IBM T. J.Watson Research Center in New York, USA; and the nation-wide French research center, INRIA.

He is the script-writer, director, and producer of the award-winning short-film "Teaching Teaching & Understanding Understanding" which is used around the world for educational development and for teaching teachers to teach for learning. The film is available on DVD in English, French, Italian, Portuguese, Spanish, German, and Danish (all of which are languages he speaks).

He has educational development experience from working with several universities, has given keynote talks at various conferences, and currently serves as a jury member of an educational film festival.