A Type-and-Effect System for Encapsulating Memory in Java
Bennett Norton Yates
Committee: Amr Sabry
Masters Thesis(Dec 1969)
Keywords:

This paper proposes a simple type-and-effect system for encapsulating memory in Java. Encapsulation is particularly relevant to Java because programs are frequently assembled from diverse sources. The ability to determine that an arbitrary expression will not affect other parts of the system is an important security issue. We start with an already developed core language and add an expression for encapsulation to the syntax. Then we extend the type system to include effect information. Our effects are simply region names and every type includes region information about the location of the instance, its fields, and the work that was done to produce it. No attempt is made to infer types or effects. Our system is rather limited but illustrates some of the issues that will have to be addressed in adapting any such system to Java.