Parser Macros for Scala

Parser macros are a new kind of macros that allow developers to create new language constructs and to define their own syntax for using them. In this report, we present why parser macros are useful and the kind of problems that they help to solve. We will also see how they are implemented and gain insight about how they take advantage from scala.meta, the new metaprogramming toolkit for Scala. Finally, we will discuss what are the current limitations of parser macros and what is left for future work

Macros in sbt: Problem Solved!

In the previous report, we described how incremental compilation was made more complicated when macro-enabled programs are involved, and we implemented the foundations of the support for metaprograms in sbt, a build tool and incremental compiler for Scala. Since then, we worked on improving the internal representation of dependency relationships between files in sbt, to make it easier to extend sbt and to define new relationships. This crucial development allowed us to fix all the remaining problems that sbt had with macros: how should we handle their transitive dependencies? How can we know what they inspect during their expansion? Are there other means by which macros could introduce dependencies? How should we use these informations? In this report, we will expose the new techniques that have been proposed and implemented to offer a complete support for metaprograms along with all their dependencies in sbt, and explain the most relevant parts of their implementation

The twilight of the Liberal Social Contract? On the Reception of Rawlsian Political Liberalism

This chapter discusses the Rawlsian project of public reason, or public justification-based 'political' liberalism, and its reception. After a brief philosophical rather than philological reconstruction of the project, the chapter revolves around a distinction between idealist and realist responses to it. Focusing on political liberalism’s critical reception illuminates an overarching question: was Rawls’s revival of a contractualist approach to liberal legitimacy a fruitful move for liberalism and/or the social contract tradition? The last section contains a largely negative answer to that question. Nonetheless the chapter's conclusion shows that the research programme of political liberalism provided and continues to provide illuminating insights into the limitations of liberal contractualism, especially under conditions of persistent and radical diversity. The programme is, however, less receptive to challenges to do with the relative decline of the power of modern states

Constitutivism

A brief explanation and overview of constitutivism