Mathematics Faculty Scholarship
Document Type
Conference Proceeding
Publication Date
2009
Publication Title
SIGCSE'09 - Proceedings of the 40th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education
Publisher
ACM
Keywords
Abstract Data Types, Containers, Interfaces, Modeling, Data Representation, Value Semantics
Abstract
The most commonly stated definition of abstract data type (ADT) is that it is a domain of values and the operations over that domain. So, for example, a language's built-in types, like int are seen to be ADTs. It is our opinion that a pure interpretation of this definition yields a semantics in which using an ADT is the same as using built-in types: the operations are side effect free and there is no concern over alias, shallow copy or synchronization problems. Unfortunately, the term abstract data type has over time been associated with at least three distinct meanings, and those incompatible definitions have often been conflated, causing confusion to students and textbook authors alike. We believe that this has resulted in a loss of appreciation for the value-based semantics of ADTs.
First Page
256
Last Page
259
Repository Citation
Buck, Duane and Stucki, David J., "The Hidden Injuries Of Overloading 'ADT" (2009). Mathematics Faculty Scholarship. 13.
https://digitalcommons.otterbein.edu/math_fac/13
Original Citation
Buck, D., and D.J. Stucki. "The Hidden Injuries Of Overloading "ADT." SIGCSE'09 - Proceedings Of The 40Th ACM Technical Symposium On Computer Science Education SIGCSE'09 - Proceedings of the 40th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education (2009): 256-259.
DOI
10.1145/1508865.1508958
Version
Publisher's Version
Publisher's Statement
Copyright 2009 ACM Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee.
Peer Reviewed
1