Wadler's Blog

I've posted this elsewhere, but neglected to blog before now. 

We are recruiting for research associate positions in design and implementation of programming languages, and also may have PhD studentships available this year and next. The posts are on the project "From Data Types to Session Types: A Basis for Concurrency and Distribution" which is a programme grant funded by EPSRC for five years from 20 May 2013, joint with Simon Gay at the University of Glasgow and Nobuko Yoshida at Imperial College London.

The RA post at Edinburgh for an initial period of 24 months, with possibility of extension, and is on the UE07 scale (£30,424 - £36,298). Deadline for applications for the RA post is Monday 20 May 2013, anyone interested in a PhD studentship should apply as soon as possible.  Glasgow and Imperial are also recruiting.

Please contact me if you are interested in either the RA post or a PhD studentship.  Further description of the Edinburgh RA post is below.



Project Description

Just as data types describe the structure of data, session types describe the structure of communication between concurrent and distributed processes. Our project has particular emphasis on putting theory into practice, by embedding session types in a range of programming languages and applying them to realistic case studies. The research programme is joint between the University of Edinburgh, University of Glasgow, and Imperial College London, and includes collaboration with Amazon, Cognizant, Red Hat, VMware, and the Ocean Observatories Initiative.

Principal Duties

The successful candidate will join a team responsible for extending the functional web programming language Links with session types to support concurrency and distribution. We will test our techniques by providing a library to access Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud computing infrastructure, and perform empirical experiments to assess how our language design impacts the performance of programmers.

You should possess a PhD in a relevant area, or be nearing completion of same, or have comparable experience. You should have a track-record of publication, or other evidence of ability to undertake research and communicate well. You should have a strong background in programming languages, including type systems, and strong programming and software engineering skills.

It is desirable for candidates to also have one or more of the following: a combination of theoretical and practical skills; experience of web programming or cloud programming; knowledge of the theory or practice of concurrent and distributed systems; knowledge of linear logic; or training in empirical measurement of programming tasks.

We seek applicants at an international level of excellence. The Laboratory for Foundations of Computer Science is internationally renowned, the School of Informatics at Edinburgh is among the strongest in the world, and Edinburgh is known as a cultural centre providing a high quality of life.

Further details of the RA post, including how to apply, are here.  

Labels: Functional Programming, Programming Languages, Session Types, Web