Craig Chambers, Professor, joined the faculty in 1991. He received his S.B. degree in Computer Science from MIT in 1986 and his Ph.D. in Computer Science from Stanford in 1992. His main research interest is the design and implementation of advanced programming languages.
At MIT, he participated in the Argus distributed programming language project, and at Stanford he was a member of the Self purely object-oriented language and compiler project.
While at UW, he has been involved in three main projects: the Cecil language project and the Vortex and DyC compiler projects. Cecil is an advanced object-oriented language designed and implemented at UW as a vehicle for the study of new language features, static type systems, and programming environments. Vortex is a complementing whole-program optimizing compiler infrastructure investigating implementation strategies for advanced languages, particularly object-oriented ones like Cecil, Java, Smalltalk, and C++. DyC is a compiler that performs selective run-time compilation to improve the performance of general- and special-purpose C programs.
Recently, he has been working on several new projects. Diesel is a new programming language that builds on the experience gained with Cecil. In part, Diesel investigates more flexible method dispatching models and novel modularity mechanisms. He is also adapting ideas pioneered in Diesel to other language contexts, including a Java extension, MultiJava, and an ML-like language, EML. Whirlwind is a new optimizing compiler infrastructure following the Vortex and DyC projects. Whirlwind attacks new optimizations for high-level languages, such as data layout specification and optimization, and studies staged compilation, which integrates separate compilation, link-time whole-program compilation, and run-time compilation. Whirlwind includes the Rhodium system for specifying optimizations that can be proven correct automatically.
Outside of work, he plays Ultimate Frisbee several times a week, hikes, travels, and observes faint nebulae.