| The focus of programming has shifted to the realm of concurrent processing. Functional languages not only provide simple, clean semantics and a high level of abstraction, but also allow for the easy generation of efficient parallel code. The thesis is an endeavor to design a robust parallel functional language, with explicit constructs for creating threads of control and message passing for communication and synchronization. The language considered is Standard ML, a functional language with imperative constructs that provide greater expressiveness for developing real software. First, a conceptual design for a message-based multiprocessor/multicomputer interface to Standard ML (called mpSML) is presented. Next, a subset of the design, consisting of the communication subsystem, is implemented on an existing shared memory platform, and is termed CMP. Finally the weaknesses of the current approaches are outlined, and a comprehensive documentation of related topics for future consideration is provided. |
