ECOOP 2025
Mon 30 June - Fri 4 July 2025 Bergen, Norway

Workshop on Programming Language Standardization and Specification

The evolution of widely adopted programming languages is critical for ensuring their sustainability, interoperability, and adaptability to changing technological and societal needs. This workshop aims to advance the understanding of programming language standardization and foster collaborative solutions for its challenges. Participants will have the opportunity to share insights, case studies, and best practices to shape the future of programming language specification and evolution.

The workshop will examine the role of specifications as the foundation for standards documents, focusing on a wide range of topics, such as:

  • mechanized specifications of programming languages
  • formal methods in programming language specifications
  • decision making in programming language standardization
  • integrating programming language standardization in CS education
  • intellectual property rights issues in programming language standardization
  • socio-technical aspects of programming language evolution
  • implications for language adoption

Whether addressing historical perspectives, emerging trends, cross-disciplinary approaches, or novel methodologies, the workshop seeks to provide a platform for exploring diverse ideas.

Plenary

This program is tentative and subject to change.

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Fri 4 Jul

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09:00 - 10:15
Opening & Keynote (WebAssembly)PLSS at M207
09:00
15m
Day opening
PLSS - Opening Session
PLSS
Mikhail Barash University of Bergen, Yulia Startsev Mozilla
09:15
60m
Keynote
Engineering a Formal Language Specification
PLSS
Andreas Rossberg Independent
Link to publication
10:15 - 10:45
Coffee BreakCatering at M130/131
10:15
30m
Coffee break
Break
Catering

12:30 - 14:00
Lunch (cafeteria K1)Catering at Cafeteria (K1)
12:30
90m
Lunch
Lunch
Catering

15:45 - 16:15
Coffee BreakCatering at M130/131
15:45
30m
Coffee break
Break
Catering

16:15 - 18:00
P4, C++, Emacs LispPLSS at M207
16:15
30m
Talk
P4-SpecTec: Mechanized Language Definition for P4
PLSS
16:45
30m
Talk
C++ Standardization: Reflections and Lessons Learned
PLSS
Jaakko Järvi University of Turku
17:15
30m
Talk
Do Programming Languages Fulfill Requirements? Should They?Remote
PLSS
Michael Sperber Active Group GmbH
17:45
5m
Day closing
PLSS - Closing Session
PLSS
Yulia Startsev Mozilla, Mikhail Barash University of Bergen

Call for Presentations

The Workshop on Programming Language Standardization and Specification invites submissions for presentations that explore the specification and standardization of widely adopted programming languages.

We welcome contributions that address a wide range of topics related to programming language specification and standardization, including but not limited to:

  • programming language specification formalisms
  • formal methods in programming language specifications
  • mechanised and executable specifications
  • HCI in programming language standardization
  • decision making in programming language standardization
  • intellectual property rights issues and legal aspects in programming language standardization
  • socio-technical aspects of programming language evolution and standardization
  • implications of standardization for language adoption
  • didactics of programming language specifications
  • integrating programming language standardization in CS education
  • “standardese” and linguistic aspects of programming language specification texts

Submission Guidelines

Prospective presenters should submit an abstract (300-500 words) outlining their proposed presentation. The abstract should clearly articulate the topic, key contributions, and relevance to the workshop themes. Submissions may include technical discussions, position statements, or experience reports. Submissions on work-in-progress are specifically encouraged. Previously presented or published work that is relevant to the workshop themes is also welcome.

Submissions will undergo a lightweight review process.

The keynote will be given by Dr. Andreas Rossberg, the author of the WebAssembly language specification and maintainer of the reference interpreter.

Engineering a Formal Language Specification

The official specification for WebAssembly includes an end-to-end formal semantics, and every new feature must be specified in this formal semantics, in prose, and in the official reference interpreter before it can be standardised. This manual process with its redundancies is laborious and error-prone. We present SpecTec, a DSL and toolchain that facilitates both the WebAssembly specification and the generation of artefacts necessary for standardisation. A definition of the WebAssembly semantics in SpecTec serves as a single source of truth, from which we can generate a typeset specification, including formal definitions and prose pseudocode descriptions, and a meta-level interpreter. Further backends for test generation and meta-theory in theorem provers are work in progress.

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Results (13)

A
Akhin, Marat
JetBrains ResearchNetherlands
B
Barash, Mikhail
University of BergenNorway
Brudzewsky, Adám
Dyalog Ltd.Denmark
F
Ficarra, Michael
F5United States
H
Hyun Lee, Jae
KAISTSouth Korea
J
Järvi, Jaakko
University of TurkuFinland
K
Kooner, Karta
Dyalog Ltd.United Kingdom
P
Park, Jihyeok
Korea UniversitySouth Korea
R
Racordon, Dimi
EPFL, LAMPSwitzerland
Rossberg, Andreas
IndependentGermany
Ryu, Sukyoung
KAISTSouth Korea
S
Sperber, Michael
Active Group GmbHGermany
Startsev, Yulia
Mozilla