High-performance Tree Wrangling, the APL Way // Aaron Hsu // Dyalog '18

Aaron Hsu explains how to manipulate and transform tree data structures in APL using arrays instead of pointers for high performance.

Aaron Hsu, Indiana University (U.S.A.) Don't let hierarchical tree like structures get you down in APL-land. Despite what modern C.S. theorists would have you believe, there's more than one way to prune, chop, graft and otherwise mangle and wrestle with tree data. Aaron discusses a novel approach to interacting with Trees, particularly in the manipulation and transformation of trees, that leverages the unique and special qualities of APL to achieve not only greatly reduced code size, but also improved performance, amenability to parallelisation and ease of maintenance/productivity improvements. These techniques are easy to pick up, general and practical. TL;DR – Why everything you learned about working with trees in University is wrong. Slides (PDF): dyalog.com/uploads/conference/dyalog18/presentations/U19_Tre… -------------------- Learn more about APL and compete for one of three $100 prizes! Open to all skill levels. challenge.dyalog.com Our other annual competition promotes APL through innovative open-source libraries and commercial apps built with Dyalog APL. The winning entry receives £2,500 GBP and an expenses-paid opportunity to present the project at a Dyalog user meeting. forge.dyalog.com --------------------