A Class-Based Object Calculus of Dynamic Binding: Reduction and Properties

To be able to compose and decompose software components at run time, some form of dynamic rebinding between components (or objects) is needed. In this paper, we identify basic properties of dynamic object (re)binding, and propose a class-based object calculus that gives precise meaning to these properties. We also define two example semantic properties that are characteristic for many concurrent programs with low-level bind/unbind operations. Our calculus has a built-in construct atomic that can be used to implement one of the semantic properties. Key-words: lambda and object calculi, dynamic binding, atomicity