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"Datafun: a functional query language" by Michael Arntzenius

Strange Loop Conference · 9.2K views · 2017-10-02 · 42:31

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Overview

Michael Arntzenius's Strange Loop talk on Datafun, a functional query language that brings database-style querying into a general-purpose language. It discusses bridging database theory and programming languages.

On Hacker News

HN recommends it as an approachable talk on a total functional generalization of Datalog, by the language's author.

Recommended by 2 HN people across 2 months · HN mentions 2018–2025

Topics

Databases & storageFunctional programmingProgramming language design
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datafundatalogstrange loopprogramming languagesdatabases

What people said

fogzen · 2025-06 · Recommendation

Yes, for some kinds of operations on some kinds of data structures. The keyword/property is "monotonicity". Monotonic functions are guaranteed to terminate under fixed-point semantics. Look into Datafun: A total functional language that generalizes Datalog. Also be sure to watch Datafun author Michael Arntzenius's Strangeloop talk. [LINK] [VIDEO]

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a-saleh · 2018-05 · Recommendation

"Streams of solution trees" kinda reminds me of mikro-kanren [1]. When I was using Clojure roughly 3 years ago, kanren was quite popular embedded logic. W.r.t. Datafun, i learned about it from a talk its creator gave on strangeloop last year [2], for me it seemed quite approachable :) [1] [LINK] [2] [VIDEO]

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refset · 2023-03 · Reference

Thanks for sharing the summary. There's also this Strange Loop 2017 talk "Datafun: a functional query language" with an early overview of this research: [VIDEO]

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Sources

Video by Strange Loop Conference, played through YouTube.

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