Chapter 6

1. Chapter 6 Type Checking

2. The compiler should report an error if an operator is applied to an incompatible operand. • Type checking can be performed without running the program. It is a static check as opposed to a dynamic check which is performed during run time. • Examples: • Flow-of-Control: if control leaves a construct is there a place for it to go to? An example is a break statement in C not enclosed within a while, for, or, switch statement. • Uniqueness: Each variable should only be declared once. A function or procedure should only be defined once. Labels in a case statement should be unique.

3. Basic types are atomic types with no internal structure visible to the programmer. Pascal examples are: boolean, character, integer and real. Subrange types like 1….10 and enumerated types, like (violet, indigo, blue, green, yellow, orange, red) are also basic types. • Constructed types built from other types. Pascal examples are arrays, records, sets and pointers. • The type of a language construct is denoted by a type expression. Type expressions are basic types or constructions of type expressions. • Basic type expressions: Includes the basic types of the language like boolean, character, integer and real. • A special basic type expression is type_error to signal the occurrence of a type check error.

4. Statements have no values and are assigned the basic type expression of void. • Type names are basic type expressions. • Array(I, T) is a type expression denoting the type of an array with elements of type T and index set I. • Cartesian product: If T1 and T2 are type expressions then T1 * T2 is a type expression. • The type of a list is the Cartesian product of the types of its elements. • E.g. if a and b are of type real then a, b is of real * real type.

5. Records: The type expression for a record with fields F1, F2, …, Fn of types T1, T2, …, Tn resply is : record ((F1 * T1) * (F2 * T2)* … * (Fn * Tn)). • Pointers: If T is a type expression then pointer(T) is the type expression for a pointer to an object of type T. • Functions: The type expression for a function is D  R where D is the type expression for the domain of the function and R is the type expression for the range of the function. If the function has no arguments then the domain type is void. • Procedures: A procedure does not return any value so it can be treated like a function where the type expression for the range is void.

6. A Simple Type Checker • The grammar is : prog  decls; expr decls  decls; decls | id : type type  char | integer | array[num] of type | type expr  literal | num | id | expr mod expr | expr [expr] | expr • A prog has decls written before expr so the types of all declared identifiers can be saved in the symbol table before the expression is checked. A translation scheme to save the types of identifiers is:

7. prog  decls; expr decls  decls; decls decls  id : type {addtype(id.entry, T.type)} type  char {T.type := char} type  integer {T .type := integer} type  type1 {T.type := pointer(T1.type)} type  array [num] of type1 {T.type := array (1..num.val, T1.type)}

8. Type checking expressions • We call a function lookup (e) to fetch the type of entry e in the symbol table. A translation scheme to type check expressions is : expr  literal {E.type := char} expr  num {E.type := integer} expr  id {E.type := lookup (id.entry)} expr  expr1 mod expr2 {E.type := if E1.type = integer and E2.type = integer then integer else type_error} expr  expr1 [ expr2 ] {E.type := if E2.type = integer and E1.type = array (s,t) then t else type_error} expr  expr1 {E.type := if E1.type = pointer (t) then t else type_error}

9. Type Checking Statements • The type expression of a statement is void if it is correct or type_error if a type error is found. • E.g. prog  decls; stmt stmt  id := expr {S.type := if lookup (id.entry) = E.type then void else type_error} stmt  if expr then stmt1 {S.type := if E.type = boolean then S1.type else type_error} stmt  while expr do stmt1 {S.type := if E.type = boolean then S1.type else type_error} stmt  stmt1 ; stmt2 {S.type := if S1.type = void then S2.type else type_error}

10. Type checking of calls to no-argument functions. The statement a := b sets a to the value returned by function b if b is a function or to the value of b if b is a variable. expr  id {E.type := if lookup(id.entry) = (void  t) or lookup (id.entry) = t then t else type_error} • Type checking of procedure statements stmt  id (expr) {S.type := if E.type = e and lookup(id.entry) = (e  void) then void else type_error} stmt  id {S.type := if lookup (id.entry) = (void  void) then void else type_error}

11. Two standard types : integer and real • Four types of variables: integer, real, integer array and real array • The index sets of all arrays are integers. We won’t keep track of the limits in type checking. • Factors, terms and expressions maybe: integer, real or boolean • Each argument of a functinon or a procedure maybe: integer, real, integer array or real array • Functions return either integers or reals • The symbol table contains the names of variables, functions and procedures

12. Encoding of type expressions: the alphabet has 8 symbols representing integer, real , integer_array, real_array, boolen, void, type_error and . • The type expression of an expression_list or a parameter_list is a string of symbols with one symbol for each element of the list. • The  symbol is used to encode functions and procedures: • The type expression for a real function of an integer and a real is: integer real real • The type expression for an integer function with no arguments is: void integer • The type expression for a procedure with an integer and a real argument is: integer real  void • The type expression for a procedure with no arguments is: void  void • The type expressions for functions and procedures in the symbol table could be stored in the name array