Future of PL

In week's reflection, try to think about the following questions:

• What's the future of programming and languages like? A lot of exciting work is going on that tries to replace text-based editors with a set of richer interfaces that allow you time travel, or guide you with holes and types.
• What does it mean for a language to be "more expressive" than another, if they're all Turing-complete? In other words, what's the point of programming in C++ rather than assembly? Find out here.

You'll see a lot of familiar things if you watch these videos: lambda calculus, type system, halting problem, bidirectional typing... I just want to show that what you learn in this class is not just greek symbols and fancy notations, but fundamental ideas that have tons of practical and cool applications.

Unfortunately, UCSB's quarter system gives me little time to talk about them in class (and I'm no expert in many of those areas), so please watch these videos to find out what exciting stuff awaits you now that you're a certified PL designer and theorist.

Pick one video from the following to watch.