Static analysis of logic programs to detect run-time garbage cells

The authors extend prior work in liveness analysis for logic programs. They develop an analysis for logic programs that allows compiler optimizations to reuse safely space allocated to data structures. The analysis is based on abstract interpretation and its main contribution consists of extending an abstract domain and operations for type and sharing analysis such that when applied to an abstract interpretation framework, the domain induces a powerful liveness analysis. Preliminary results obtained by an experimental prototype confirmed that useful and detailed information about the lifetime of term substructures can be derived.<>