[racket-dev] [plt] Push #24906: master branch updated

On Jun 26, 2012, at 1:30 AM, Ryan Culpepper wrote:

> On 06/25/2012 10:25 PM, Stevie Strickland wrote:
>> [Hit Reply instead of Reply All, so fixing that here.]
>> 
>> On Jun 25, 2012, at 11:53 PM, Ryan Culpepper wrote:
>> 
>>> On 06/25/2012 09:27 PM, Stevie Strickland wrote:
>>>> On Jun 25, 2012, at 11:21 PM, Ryan Culpepper wrote:
>>>> 
>>>>> On 06/25/2012 09:04 PM, Asumu Takikawa wrote:
>>>>>> On 2012-06-25 20:17:33 -0600, Ryan Culpepper wrote:
>>>>>>> IIUC from your later message, you've implemented the generics
>>>>>>> analogue of object/c (per-instance contract), whereas
>>>>>>> prop:dict/contract is closer to class/c (per-type contract). It's a
>>>>>>> little fuzzy because prop:dict/contract hacks in per-instance
>>>>>>> contracts too in a kind of ad hoc way.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> That's a good point. The better analogy might be interface contracts vs.
>>>>>> class/c. With generics, it is easy to control all points that an
>>>>>> instance is created since constructors are just procedures. With
>>>>>> classes, you can't get away with that since the instantiation forms are
>>>>>> macros.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> The difference/advantage you might get with a per-type contract for
>>>>>> generics is that you get a more interface-like blame story, as with
>>>>>> interface contracts. Coverage isn't as much of an issue since you can
>>>>>> just contract all constructors.
>>>>>> 
>>>>>> Unfortunately, it's also not clear how to implement interface-like
>>>>>> contracts for generics. Since the generics forms don't control the
>>>>>> constructors, it's not obvious how to instantiate the blame at the
>>>>>> construction site.
>>>>> 
>>>>> You don't want to blame the construction site; the relevant
>>>>> party is the implementation site, where the generic interface
>>>>> is associated with concrete methods within a 'struct' form. See
>>>>> the docs for 'struct-type-property/c' for an example.
>>>> 
>>>> Well, there are two blame parties, right?
>>>> 
>>>> Much like interface contracts mediate between the creator of a
>>>> class (that implements the interface) and the client of that
>>>> class (that instantiates objects from that interface), I would
>>>> think the contracts for a generic interface would be between the
>>>> creator of a specific instance (the implementation site) and the
>>>> user of that specific instance (the constructor site).
>>>> 
>>>> Stevie
>>> 
>>> The analogy to interface contracts doesn't help me, because I don't
>>> know anything about them. But I think I disagree.
>>> 
>>> (module GEN racket
>>>  ....
>>>  (define-generics has-prime
>>>    (get-a-prime has-prime))
>>>  (provide-generics-with-contract
>>>    (has-prime [get-a-prime (->  has-prime? prime?)])))
>>> 
>>> (module IMPL racket
>>>  ....
>>>  (struct prime-box (val)
>>>    #:methods gen:has-prime
>>>    [(define (get-a-prime self) (prime-box-val self))])
>>>  (provide (struct-out prime-box)))
>>> 
>>> (module CLIENT racket
>>>  ....
>>>  (define p (prime-box 4))
>>>  (get-a-prime p)) ;; ERROR
>>> 
>>> I think IMPL should be blamed for violating the contract on gen:has-prime.
>>> 
>>> As I see it, GEN establishes an obligation on implementors of
>>> 'has-prime'. IMPL provides an implementation that turns out to be
>>> faulty; it doesn't live up to the obligation imposed by GEN. CLIENT
>>> is blameless; I don't see how the location of the constructor call
>>> has anything to do with it.
>> 
>> I agree that IMPL is the positive blame party here and should be
>> blamed for not returning a prime?,
> 
> So far so good....
> 
> > but that's because in this example
>> it's not protecting itself from bad prime-box values.  It shouldn't
>> suggest that it will, in fact, return prime numbers if it isn't
>> protecting its constructor with a contract, or checking inside its
>> implementation of get-a-prime that it is going to return a prime
>> number without that constructor guarantee.
> 
> Why "but"? You have explained why IMPL is at fault. It accepted an obligation and failed to meet it.

The choice of "but" here was a poor one.  Replace it with "and".  I think we've been violently agreeing on the point that positive blame should be implementations, and that choice is extremely important for reasons below.

>> As for the negative blame, who should be responsible?  Who's
>> responsible for the negative blame that gets triggered below, where
>> we have a generic interface for containers mapping names to public
>> keys?
>> 
>> (module GEN racket
>> ....
>> (define-generics key-container
>>   ([get-key (->  key-container? (->  string? prime?))]))
>> (provide gen:key-container))
>> 
>> (module IMPL racket
>> ....
>> (struct my-key-container (hash)
>>  #:methods gen:key-container
>>  [(define (get-key self) (lambda (str) (hash-ref my-key-container-hash str)))])
>> (provide (struct-out my-key-generator))
>> 
>> (module CLIENT racket
>> ....
>> (define gen (my-key-generator (hash '(("foo" . 5)))))
>> (define key-lookup (get-key gen))
>> (key-lookup 'bad-key))
>> 
>> I'd say the person who created the generator (that is, the person who
>> called the constructor, analogous to the object creator in the
>> interface story).  If they wanted to pass off key-lookup to someone
>> else without being blamed for bad  inputs, then they, of course,
>> could just provide it with a contract.
> 
> Let's split the CLIENT module up into three regions/labels/submodules/whatever:
> 
> C1: (define gen (my-key-generator (hash '(("foo" . 5)))))
> C2: (define key-lookup (get-key gen))
> C3: (key-lookup 'bad-key))
> 
> C2 should be blamed. The contract on get-key is (or should be)
> 
>  (-> key-container? (-> string? prime?))
> 
> so C2 gets back a value that it is obligated to treat as a
> 
>  (-> string? prime?)
> 
> but it allows that value to be misused (at point C3, but it is C2 that incurred the obligation).
> 
> It's definitely *not* the site of the creation of the generator (C1) that should be blamed.

For the most part, I agree that C2 looks like the most straightforward source of negative blame.  I'd just stop the email and say I agree, except for a problem that comes up in the following case:

>> * What happens if you just call (get-a-prime 5) or (get-key 5)?  This
>> seems to be a whole different blame story than someone who just
>> creates a bad instance (like in your example), or who uses an
>> instance badly (like in my example).  In a way, that might be akin to
>> the following:
>> 
>> (define/contract (f x) (->  number? number?) x)
>> (f 3 5)
>> 
>> Instead of being a contract error, this is just a runtime error
>> (partially due to implementation details, but even if you erase the
>> contract, it's still a runtime error, so that's okay).  Similarly,
>> (get-a-prime 5) would be a runtime error without the contracts, so
>> I'm fine with it still being a runtime error with them, and only
>> having contracts mediate interactions that involve actual instances
>> of a generic structure.
> 
> No, (get-a-prime 5) is just a contract error. The contract of get-a-prime is
> 
>  (-> has-prime? prime?)
> 
> The contract form for generic interfaces should protect both the interface itself (the capability to define structs that implement it) and the generic functions that it defines. (Just like the provide/contract struct form protects both the constructor and the accessors.)

Who is the positive blame in this case?  We don't have a particular implementation to blame here.  The reason I chose C1, not C2, as the negative blame is because the existence of a particular implementation gives us the appropriate positive blame.  Without it, I don't know how to contract this appropriately.

Stevie