The mainspring of research in LFCS is the study of theories which underlie, or should in future underlie, the analysis and design of computing systems. The work has a core of theoretical research and a practical component which explores application and implementation of the theory. The list of grants gives a pretty good overview of the research done in LFCS. There are several research groups and LFCS member work on many projects.
The current projects Mobius and ReQueST are described in the group's own Web page.
A portfolio of database and XML research grants is described in the Database Group's project page.
The PEPA project uses process-algebraic formalisms for the quantitative modelling and analysis of systems composed of concurrent co-operating components.
The goal of the Links project is to design a language for distributing tasks and translating between the suitable languages in the three tiers of a typical web program: front-end (the browser), middle-tier (server, executing the logic that controls interaction with the web site) and back-end (database providing the information accessed). Links will incorporate ideas proven in other programming languages: support for database programming from Kleisli, for XML programming from Xduce, for web interaction from PLT Scheme, and for distribution from Erlang. It will be developed by a consortium, as were ML and Haskell. Like all of these languages, it will be functional.
GAMES is a Research Training Network funded by the European Comission under the Fifth Framework Programme. The collaboration involves seven European universities and one from the US. There is a growing need for formal methods that guarantee the reliability, correctness, and efficiency of computerised systems. This project adresses this challenge by developing specification and validation methodologies that are based on games and automata. Oriented at both foundational research and modern applications, this network aims to provide a novel set of techniques for the synthesis and validation of computing systems.
The MRG project was funded in 2002-2005 under the Global Computing pro-active initiative of the Future and Emerging Technologies part of the Information Society Technologies programme of the European Commission's Fifth Framework Programme.
The Mobile Resource Guarantees (MRG) project has developed the infrastructure needed to endow mobile code with independently verifiable certificates describing its resource behaviour (space, time, etc.).
APPSEM is a working group in the ESPRIT programme of the European Union. The project aims to bring together programming language reseachers, with the specific aim of improving communication between theoreticians and practitioners. We hope to focus theoreticians' attention on important practical problems as well as to speed up the application of new theoretical ideas in practice.
The Edinburgh .NET lab aims to stimulate research projects in Informatics where .NET is a relevant technology. Microsoft have funded ten Windows XP machines, fully equipped with the .NET development environment and supporting software tools. All Informatics staff and PhD students are welcome to use the lab, as are MSc or undergraduate students with a research interest in working with .NET.