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Efficient Groundness Analysis in Prolog

Howe, Jacob M., King, Andy (2003) Efficient Groundness Analysis in Prolog. Theory and Practice of Logic Programming, 3 (1). pp. 95-124. ISSN 1471-0684. (doi:10.1017/S1471068402001485) (KAR id:37536)

Abstract

Boolean functions can be used to express the groundness of, and trace grounding dependencies between, program variables in (constraint) logic programs. In this paper, a variety of issues pertaining to the efficient Prolog implementation of groundness analysis are investigated, focusing on the domain of definite Boolean functions, Def. The systematic design of the representation of an abstract domain is discussed in relation to its impact on the algorithmic complexity of the domain operations; the most frequently called operations should be the most lightweight. This methodology is applied to Def, resulting in a new representation, together with new algorithms for its domain operations utilising previously unexploited properties of Def -- for instance, quadratic-time entailment checking. The iteration strategy driving the analysis is also discussed and a simple, but very effective, optimisation of induced magic is described. The analysis can be implemented straightforwardly in Prolog and the use of a non-ground representation results in an efficient, scalable tool which does not require widening to be invoked, even on the largest benchmarks. An extensive experimental evaluation is given.

Item Type: Article
DOI/Identification number: 10.1017/S1471068402001485
Uncontrolled keywords: abstract interpretation; groundness analysis; definite Boolean functions; fix-point algorithms.
Subjects: A General Works
Divisions: Divisions > Division of Computing, Engineering and Mathematical Sciences > School of Computing
Depositing User: Andy King
Date Deposited: 12 Dec 2013 16:01 UTC
Last Modified: 16 Nov 2021 10:14 UTC
Resource URI: https://kar.kent.ac.uk/id/eprint/37536 (The current URI for this page, for reference purposes)

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