Talk:Closure (computer programming)/to do

• Introduction
  • Rewrite lead paragraph
    • Closure = Function + Environment
    • What happens when creating a closure? (Closure captures the current lexical environment)
    • What happens when entering a closure? (Function is executed in the lexical environemnt captured by the closure)
    • Picture?
  • Add an introductory section
    • Targeted primarily at imperative programmers who have little experience with non-local variables
• History
  • Early languages: POP-2
• Semantics
  • Closure (computer programming)#Differences in semantics: Scheme (variables in scope) vs. Smalltalk (variables + return + self) vs, Java 7/8/... (variables + return + this + exceptions + ...)
  • Capturing loop variables
  • Capture by reference vs. capture by copy, extending the lifetime and garbage collection (compare C++)
• Implementation
  • Luca Cardelli, Compiling a Functional Language.
  • Simon Peyton Jones, Implementation of Functional Programming Languages.
  • Z. Shao and A. W. Appel. Space-efficient closure representations.
  • Upvalues: Roberto Ierusalimschy et al., "The Implementation of Lua 5.0"
• Applications: thunk (delayed computation), memoization, object system, hidden state/static variables
  • Closure (computer programming)#Closures and state representation: This can be used in lazy pure languages as well, e.g. storing a memoization table in the closure which is lazyily evaluated when needed but not discarded.