A type system for context-dependent overloading.

Abstract

This article presents a type system for context-dependent overloading, based on the notion of constrained types. These are types constrained by the definition of functions or constants of given types. This notion supports both overloading and a form of subtyping, and is related to Haskell type classes [11,2], System O [7] and other systems with constrained types. We study an extension of the Damas-Milner system [4,1] with constrained types. The inference system presented uses a context-dependent overloading policy, which is specified by means of a predicate used in a single inference rule. The idea simplifies the treatment of overloading, enables the simplification of inferred types (by means of class type annotations), and is adequate for use in a type system with higher-order types.