The problem of incremental overload resolution is now the key impediment to the development of incremental compilers for ADA and other modern programming languages appropriate for largescale software development. The objective of this proposal is to develop, analyze and measure a high-performance algorithm for incremental overload resolution and to examine the feasibility of combining that algorithm with other compiler technologies in an integrated software development environment. The research will also incorporate several promising heuristics for improving the expected performance of the algorithm. In combination with other technologies this algorithm should dramatically reduce the time for the edit-compile-link cycle in the maintenance personnel with attendant gains in software reliability.The potential commercial application as described by the awardee: An estimated 90% of the cost of large software systems is in maintenance costs. In conjunction with other tools, the algorithm to be developed here can improve productivity during maintenance by dramatically reducing reprocessing time when changes are made.
