Partial Evaluation, Imperative Languages and C

			    Olav Beckmann

			      March 1996

			       Abstract
			       --------

The  aim of this  survey  is to provide   a review for  someone who is
interested in partial evaluation in general and partial evaluation for
imperative  languages,  especially C, in    particular. The paper will
argue that getting partial evaluation for imperative languages to work
well is a highly desirable goal, since  the technique offers very wide
benefits,  but will  not  be widely  usable unless  available for some
commonly used   languages. Section~1  defines partial   evaluation and
explains  a range of frequently encountered  terms, Section 2 looks at
why partial evaluation is interesting  and Section~3 gives a review of
some    key   contributions   to      the     field.   Within    that,
paragraph~\ref{sec-heng} is  very   relevant   to  the following   two
sections. These look    first  at partial evaluation  for   imperative
languages in general (Section 4),  and then at  the special case of  C
(Section 5). Finally, Section~6 concludes.