Overview

The goal of the OCamlDuce project is to extend the OCaml language with features to make it easier to write safe and efficient complex applications that need to deal with XML documents. In particular, it relies on a notion of types and patterns to guarantee statically that all the possible input documents are correctly processed, and that only valid output documents are produced.

In a nutshell, OCamlDuce extends OCaml with a new kind of values (x-values) to represent XML documents, fragments, tags, Unicode strings. In order to describe these values, it also extends the type algebra with so-called x-types. The philosophy behind these types is that they represent set of x-values. They can be very precise: indeed, each value can be seen as a singleton type (a set with a single value), and it is possible to form Boolean combinations of x-types (intersection, union, difference).

OCamlDuce's type system can be understood as a refinement of OCaml. For each sub-expression which is inferred to be of the x-kind (using OCaml unification based type-system), OCamlDuce will try to infer to best possible sound x-type. Here, best means smallest for the natural subtyping relation (set inclusion). The inference algorithm is actually a data-flow analysis: the x-type will collect all the values that can be produced by the expression, considering all the possible data-flow in the program. It it sometimes necessary to provide explicit type annotations to help the type checker infer this type, in particular when you define recursive functions or when you use iterators.

Subtyping is implicit for x-types: if an expression is inferred to be of x-type t, which is a subtype of s, then it is possible to use this expression in any context which expects a value of type s.

Getting started

Most of the new language features are enclosed within double curly braces {{...}}. For instance, the following code sample defines a value x as an XML element (with tag a, an attribute href, and a simple string as content):

# let x = {{ <a href="http://www.cduce.org">['CDuce'] }};;
val x : {{<a href=[ 'http://www.cduce.org' ]>[ 'CDuce' ]}} =
  {{<a href="http://www.cduce.org">[ 'CDuce' ]}}

What appears between the curly braces is called an x-expression. Similarly, there are x-types (as seen above), and also x-patterns. The delimiters {{...}} are only used for syntactical reasons, to avoid clashed between OCaml and CDuce syntaxes and lexical conventions. As a matter of fact, an OCaml expression need not be a syntactical x-expression (delimited by double curly braces) to evaluate to an x-value. For instance, once x has been declared as above, the expression x evaluates to an x-value.

It is possible to use an arbitrary OCaml expression as part of an x-expression: it must simply be protected by a new pair of double curly braces. For instance, there is no if-then-else construction for x-expressions, but you can write:

# {{ <a href={{if true then {{"a"}} else {{"z"}}}}>[] }};;
- : {{<a href=[ 'a' | 'z' ]>[  ]}} = {{<a href="a">[ ]}}

Only the highlighted parts are parsed as x-expressions. The if-then-else sub-expression is parsed as an OCaml expression, but its type is an x-type (namely {{[ 'a' | 'z' ]}}).

X-values

X-values are intended to represent XML documents and fragments thereof: elements, tags, text, sequences. In this section, we present the x-value algebra, the syntax of the corresponding x-expression constructors and the associated x-types.

There are three kinds of atomic kind of x-values:

  • Unicode characters;
  • qualified names;
  • arbitrarily large integers.

Characters

X-characters are different from OCaml characters. They can represent the range of Unicode codepoints defined in the XML specification. Character literals are delimited by single quotes. The escape sequences \n, \r, \t, \b, \', \", \\ are recognized as usual. The numerical escape sequence are written \n; where n is an integer literal (note the extra semi-colon). The source code is interpreted as being encoded in iso-8859-1. As a consequence, Unicode characters which are not part of the Latin1 character set must be introduced with this numerical escape mechanism. The x-types for x-characters are:

  • singletons;
  • intervals, written c -- d, where c and d are literals (example: type t = {{ 'a'--'z' }});
  • the type of all x-characters, written Char;
  • the type of all Latin1 characters, written Latin1Char (defined as \0; -- \255;).

Integers

X-integers are arbitrarily large. Literals must be written in decimal. Negative literals must be in parenthesis. E.g.: (-3). The x-types for x-integers are:

  • singletons;
  • intervals, written i -- j, where i and j are literals (example: type t = {{ 10--20 }}); it is possible to replace i or j with ** to define open-ended intervals, e.g. type pos = {{ 1 -- ** }};
  • the type of all x-integers, written Int;
  • the type of all the integers which can be represented by a signed 32 (resp. 64) bit machine word, written Int32 (resp. Int64).

Qualified names

Qualified names are intended to represent XML tag names. Conceptually, they are made of a namespace URI and a local name. Since URIs tends to be long, literals are of the form `prefix:local where local is the local name and prefix is an namespace prefix bound to some URI (in the scope of the literal). The local name follows the definitions from the XML Namespaces specification; a dot character must be protected by a backslash and non-Latin1 characters are written as character literals \n;. See below for a explanation on how to bind prefixes to URIs. To refer to the default namespace (or the absence of namespace if not default has been defined), the syntax is simply `local. The x-types for qualified names are:

  • singletons;
  • the type of all qualified names, written Atom;
  • the type of all qualified names from a specified namespace, written `ns:*.

Records

X-records are mainly used to represent the set of attributes of an XML element. An x-record is a binding from a finite set of labels to x-values. Labels follows the same syntax as for qualified names without the leading backquote. However, if the namespace prefix is not given, the default namespace does not apply (the namespace URI is empty). The syntax for record x-expressions is { l1=e1 ... ln=en } where the li are labels and the ei are x-expressions. Fields can also be separated with a semi-colon. It is legal to omit the expression for a field; the label is then taken as the content of the field (a value with this name must be defined in the current scope), e.g.: let x = ... and y = ... in {{ {x y z=3} }} is equivalent to let x = ... and y = ... in {{ {x=x y=y z=3} }}. The types for x-records specify which labels are authorized/mandatory, and what the types of the corresponding fields are. There are two kind of record x-types:

  • Closed record types, which only allow a finite number of fields: { l1=t1 ... ln=tn };
  • Open record types, which allow additional fields (with arbitrary type): { l1=t1 ... ln=tn .. } (the final two colons are in the syntax).

In both cases, it is possible to make one of the fields optional by changing = to =?.

The x-type of all x-record is thus { .. }, and the x-type of x-records with maybe a field l of type Int and maybe arbitrary other fields is { l=?Int .. }.

Sequences

X-sequences are finite and ordered collections of x-values. The syntax for a sequence x-expression in [ e1 ... en ] (note that elements are not separated by semi-colons as in OCaml list). Each item ei can either be:

  • an x-expression;
  • !e where e is an x-expression which evaluates to a sequence (whose content is inserted in the sequence which is currently defined); e.g. let x = [ 2 3 ] in [ 1 !x 4 ] is equivalent to [ 1 2 3 4 ];
  • a string literal delimited by simple quotes; e.g. [ 'abc' ] is equivalent to [ 'a' 'b' 'c' ].

X-types for sequences are of the form [R] where R is a regular expression over x-types which describe the possible contents of the sequences. The possible forms of regular expressions are:

  • t (one single element of x-type t)
  • R* (zero or more repetitions)
  • R+ (one or more repetitions)
  • R? (zero or one repetition)
  • R1 R2 (sequence)
  • R1|R2 (alternation)
  • (R)
  • /t (guard: the tail of the sequence must comply with t).
  • PCDATA (equivalent to Char*).
Note: sequence are actually encoded with embedded pairs and a terminator, and sequences types are encoded with product types and recursive types. The encoding is available to the programmer but not described in this manual.

Strings

Strings are nothing but sequences of characters. There are two predefined types String and Latin1 (defined as [ Char* ] and [ Latin1Char* ]).

A string literal [ '...' ] can also be written "..." (without the square brackets). Note that simple (resp. double) quotes need to be escaped only when the string is delimited with double (resp. simple) quotes.

XML elements

An XML element is a triple of x-values. The syntax for the corresponding x-expression constructor is <(e1) (e2)>e3. When e1 is a qualified name literal, it is possible to omit the leading backquote and the surrounding parentheses. Similarly, when e2 is an x-record literal, it is possible to omit the curly braces and the parentheses. For instance, one can simply write <a href="abc">['def'] instead of <(`a) ({href="abc"})>['def'].

XML element x-type are written <(t1) (t2)>t3, and the same simplifications applies. For instance, if the namespace prefix ns has been defined, the following is a legal x-type <ns:* ..>[]; it describes XML elements whose tag is in the namespace bound to ns, with an empty content, and with an arbitrary set of attributes. An underscore in place of (t1) is equivalent to (Atom) (any tag).

X-expressions

In the previous section, we have seen the syntax for x-values constructors (constant literals, sequence, record, element constructors). In this section, we describe the other kinds of x-expressions.

Binary infix operators

The arithmetic operators on integers follow the usual precedence. They are written +,*,-,div,mod (they are all infix).

Record concatenation: e1 ++ e2. The x-expressions e1 and e2 must evaluate to x-records. The result is obtained by concatening them. If a field with the same label is present in both records, the right-most one is selected.

Sequence concatenation: e1 @ e2, equivalent to [!e1 !e2].

Projections, filtering

If the x-expression e evaluates to a record or an XML element, the construction e.l will extract the value of field or attribute l. Similarly, the construction e.?l will extract the value of field or attribute l if present, and return the empty sequence [] otherwise.

If the x-expression e evaluates to a record, the construction e -. l will produce a new record where the field l has been removed (if present).

If the x-expression e evaluates to an x-sequence, the construction e/ will result in a new x-sequence obtained by taking in order all the children of the XML elements from the sequence e. For instance, the x-expression [<a>[ 1 2 3 ] 4 5 <b>[ 6 7 8 ] ]/ evaluates to the x-value [ 1 2 3 6 7 8 ].

If the x-expression e evaluates to an x-sequence, the construction e.(t) (where t is an x-type) will result in a new x-sequence obtained by filtering e to keep only the elements of type t. For instance, the x-expression [<a>[ 1 2 3 ] 4 5 <b>[ 6 7 8 ] ].(Int) evaluates to the x-value [ 4 5 ].

Dynamic type checking

If e is an x-expression and t is an x-type, the construction (e :? t) returns the same result as e if it has type t, and otherwise raises a Failure exception whose argument explains why this is not the case.

# let f (x : {{ Any }}) = {{ (x :? <a>[ Int* ] ) }} in
  f {{ <a>[ 1 2 '3' ] }};;
Exception:
Failure
 "Value <a>[ 1 2 '3' ] does not match type <a>[ Int* ]\nValue '3' does not match type Int\n".

Pattern matching

OCamlDuce comes with a powerful pattern matching operation. X-patterns are described below. The syntax for the pattern matching operation is: match e with p1 -> e1 | ... | pn -> en. The type-system ensures exhaustivivity for the pattern matching and infers precise types for the capture variables. It is also possile to use x-pattern matching as a regular OCaml expression; x-patterns must be surrounded by {{..}}, e.g.: match e with {{p1}} -> e1 | ... | {{pn}} -> en function {{p1}} -> e1 | ... | {{pn}} -> en

Pattern matching follows is first-match policy. The first pattern that succeeds triggers the corresponding branch.

Note: currently it is impossible to mix normal OCaml patterns and x-patterns in a single pattern matching.

Local binding

The x-expression let p=e1 in e2 is equivalent to match e1 with p -> e2. There is also an local binding with an x-pattern in OCaml expressions: let p=e1 in e2.

Iterators

OCamlDuce comes with a sequence iterator map e with p1 -> e1 | ... | pn -> en and a tree iterator map* e with p1 -> e1 | ... | pn -> en.

For both constructions, the argument must evaluate to a sequence. The map iterator applies the patterns to each element of this sequence in turns and produces a new sequence by concatenating all the results (all the right-hand sides must thus produce a sequence). The set of patterns must be exhaustive for all the possible elements of the input sequence.

The tree iterator is similar except that the patterns need not be exhaustive. If some element of the input sequence is not matched, it is simply copied into the result unless it is an XML element. In this case, the transformation is applied recursively to its content.

OCaml constructions

As a convenience, some of the OCaml expression constructors are allowed as x-expressions (without a need to go back to OCaml with double curly braces): (unqualified) value identifiers without apostrophes and function calls.

More on x-types

We have seen how to write simple x-types. We can then combine them with Boolean connectives:

  • t1 & t2: intersection;
  • t1 | t2: union;
  • t1 - t2: difference.

The empty x-type is written Empty (it contains no value), and the universal x-type is written Any (it contains all the x-values) or _.

When an x-type has been bound to some OCaml identifier (type t = {{...}}), it is possible to use this identifier in another x-type. Recursive definitions are allowed:

type t1 = {{ <a>[ t2* ] }}
and  t2 = {{ <b>[ t1* ] }}

Note that x-values are always finite and acyclic. The type checker detects type definition which would yield empty types:

# type t = {{ <a>[ t+ ] }};;
This definition yields an empty type

If t1 and t2 are record x-types, we can combine them with the infix ++ operator, which mimics the corresponding operator on expressions (record concatenation). Similarly, we can use the infix @ concatenation operator on sequence x-types.

X-patterns

X-patterns follow the same syntax as X-types. In particular, any X-type is a valid X-pattern. In addition to X-types constructors, X-patterns can have:

  • capture variables (lowercase OCaml identifiers without apostrophes);
  • constant bindings (x := c) where x is a capture variable and c is a literal x-constant (this pattern always succeeds and returns the binding x->c).

An identifier in an X-pattern can be either a reference to a named X-type (if such a type declaration is in scope) or a capture variable (otherwise).

Here is a brief description of the semantics of patterns. Given an input value, a pattern can either succeed or fail. If it succeeds, it also produces a bindings from the capture variables in the pattern to x-values.

  • A pattern which is just a type (no capture variable) succeeds if and only if the value has the type.
  • A pattern p1 | p2 succeeds if either p1 or p2 succeed, and returns the corresponding binding; if both patterns succeeds, p1 wins. It is required that p1 and p2 have the same sets of capture variables.
  • A pattern p1 & p2 succeeds if both p1 and p2 succeed, and returns the concatenation of the two bindings. It is required that p1 and p2 have disjoint sets of capture variables.

In record x-patterns, it is possible to omit the =p part of a field. The content is then replaced with the label name considered as a capture variable (or as a previously defined type). E.g. { x y=p } is equivalent to { x=x y=p }.

It is also possible to add an "else" clause: { x = (a,_)|(a:=3) } will accept any record with atmost the field x. If the content is a pair, the capture variable a will be bound to its component; otherwise, it is set to 3.

In regular expressions, it is possible to extract whole subsequences with the notation x::R, e.g.: [ _* x::Int+ _* ]

If the same sequence capture variable appears several times (or below a repetition) in a regexp, it is bound to the concatenation of all matched subsequences. E.g.: [ (x::Int | _)* ] will collect in x all the elements of type Int from a sequence. It is not legal to have repeated simple capture variables.

The regexp operators +,*,? are greedy by default (they match as long as possible). They admit non-greedy variants +?,*?,??.

Namespace bindings

The binding of namespace prefixes to URIs can be done either by toplevel phrases (structure items) or by local declarations:

# {{ namespace ns = "http://..." }};;
# let x = {{ `ns: x }};;
val x : {{`ns:x}} = {{`ns:x}}
# let x = {{ let namespace ns = "http://..." in `ns:x }};;
val x : {{`ns:x}} = {{`ns:x}}

The toplevel definitions can also appear in module interfaces (signatures). A toplevel prefix binding is not exported by a module: its scope is limited to the current structure or signature. It is possible to specify a default namespace, and to reset it:

# {{ namespace "http://..." }};;
# {{ `x }};;
- : {{`ns1:x}} = {{`ns1:x}}
# {{ namespace "" }};;
# {{ `x }};;
- : {{`x}} = {{`x}}

Note that the value pretty-printer invented some prefix for the namespace URI. The default prefix declaration also have a local form let namespace "..." in ... .

More on type-checking

Type inference

As we said above, the programmer is sometimes required to provide type annotations. To know where to put these annotation, it is necessary to get a basic understanding of how type-checking works.

The OCaml type-checker is run first to detect which sub-expressions are of the x-kind. A second ML type-checking pass is then done to introduce subsumption (implicit subtyping) steps where allowed. After these two passes, the OCamlDuce type checker obtains a data-flow summary of x-values in the whole compilation unit. This is a directed graph, whose edges represent either simple data-flow or complex operation on x-values. The nodes of the graph can be thought as x-type variables. A data-flow edge corresponds to a subtyping constraints, and an operation edge corresponds to a symbolic constraints which mimics the corresponding operation on values.

Some of the nodes are given an explicit type by the programmer, through type annotations (on expressions or function arguments) or the other usual mechanism in ML (data type declarations, signatures, ...).

Also, if there is a loop with only subtyping edges in the graph, all the nodes on the loop are merged together.

After this operation, the graph is required to be acyclic (assuming that the nodes with an explicit type are removed from the graph). It is the responsibility of the programmer to provide enough type annotation to achieve this property. Otherwise, a type error is issued.

# let rec f x = match x with 0 -> {{ [] }} | n -> {{ f {{n-1}} @ ['.'] }};;
Cycle detected: cannot type-check
# let rec f x : {{ String }} = match x with 0 -> {{ [] }} | n -> {{ f {{n-1}} @ ['.'] }};;
val f : int -> {{String}} = <fun>

In the example above, there is a cycle between the result type for f and the type for the sub-expression f {{n-1}}. It is here broken with a type annotation on the result; it could have been broken by a type annotation on the expression f {{n-1}}, or on the function f itself, or by a module signature.

Let us study another simple example:

# let f x = {{ x + 1 }} in f {{ 2 }}, f {{ 3 }};;
- : {{3--4}} * {{3--4}} = ({{3}}, {{4}})

The type-checkers detects that the two x-values 2 and 3 can flow to the argument of f. Its body is thus type-checked with the assumption that x has type 2--3. The computed result type is then 3--4.

The type-inference process described above is global by nature. The acyclicity condition is only imposed after a whole compilation unit has been type-checked by OCaml (and the information from the module interface as been integrated). When a type variable is inferred to be of the x-kind, it is never generalized. As a consequence, there is no parametric polymorphism on x-types.

In the toplevel, type-checking is done after each phrase. Consider the following session:

# let f x = {{ x + 1 }};;
val f : {{Empty}} -> {{Empty}} = <fun>
# let a = f {{ 2 }};;
Subtyping failed 2 <= Empty
Sample:
2

The function f is inferred to have type {{Empty}} -> {{Empty}} because when the first phrase is type-checked, the data-flow graph says that no value can flow to x, and thus the input type is empty (and similarly for the result type). If the two phrases were type-checked together (which would be the case it they had been compiled by the compiler, not in the toplevel), the type checker would have correctly inferred that the input type for f must contain 2.

Implicit subtyping

Coercion from an x-type to a super type is automatic in OCamlDuce. However, this automatic subsumption does not carry over to OCaml type constructor, even if there are covariant. Consider:

# let f (x : {{ Int }} * {{ Int }}) = 1;;
val f : {{Int}} * {{Int}} -> int = <fun>
# let g (x : {{ 0 }} * {{ 0 }}) = f x;;
This expression has type {{0}} * {{0}} but is here used with type
  {{Int}} * {{Int}}
# let g (x : {{ 0 }} * {{ 0 }}) = let a,b = x in f (a,b);;
val g : {{0}} * {{0}} -> int = <fun>
# let g (x : {{ 0 }} * {{ 0 }}) = f (x :> {{ Int }} * {{ Int }});;
val g : {{0}} * {{0}} -> int = <fun>

The first attempt to define g fails because the type for x is not an x-type and thus subsumption does not apply. In the second attempt, we extract the two components of the pair; since they are inferred to be x-values, subtyping applies to both of them. Thus, when the pair (a,b) is reconstructed, it is legal to unify its type with the input type of f. The third definition for g gives an alternative solution: using explicit OCaml type coercions.

Exchanging values

OCamlDuce strongly seperates regular OCaml values from the new x-values. They have different syntax, expressions, types, patterns, and even type-checking algorithms. This strong segregation is key point which allowed a simple integration between very different type systems.

At some point, it is still necessary to cross the frontier and translate OCaml values to x-values or the opposite.

Fortunately, OCamlDuce provides automatic translations in both directions. Instead of double curly braces, you can enclose x-expressions in curly brace+colon {: ... :} (here, the ... is an x-expression). The effect is to translate the result of the x-expression (which must be an x-value) to an OCaml value. Similarly, in an x-expression, you can obtain the x-translation of an OCaml value with the same syntax {: ... :} (here, the ... is an OCaml expression).

Here is how the translation works. To each OCaml type t, we associate an x-type T(t) and a pair of translation function between t and T(t). Actually, not all the features are supported. For instance, free type variables, abstract types, object types, non-regular recursive types cannot be translated. In particular, since type variables are not allowed, the OCaml type must be fully known.

The translation for an OCaml type t is defined by structural induction on t. Sum types are translated to union types: a constant constructor A is translated to the qualified name `A; a non-constant constructor A of t1 * ... * tn is translated to <A>[ T(t1) ... T(tn) ]. Closed polymorphic variants have the same translation. Record types are translated to closed record x-types. Some other translations:

Caml type tX-type T(t)
intInt
int32Int32
int64Int64
stringLatin1
t list[T(t)*]
t array[T(t)*]
unit[]
charLatin1Char
{{t}}t

Here is an example:

# let f (x : {{ Int }}) = {{ x + 1 }} in List.map f {: [ 1 2 3 ] :};;
- : {{Int}} list = [{{2}}; {{3}}; {{4}}]

In this example, the result type of the translation is inferred to be {{ Int }} list (because the type for f is given). The corresponding x-type is {{ [Int*] }}.

The standard library

In OCamlDuce, the Num library from OCaml is included in the standard library. In addition, there are two new module called Ocamlduce and Cduce_types in the standard library.

The module Cduce_types gives access to the internal representation of x-values. It is currently undocumented.

The module Ocamlduce provides several useful functionality x-values. See the ocamldoc generated documentation for a description of its interface.

Marshaling

OCamlDuce use some tricks on its internal representation of x-values to reduce memory usage and improve performance. You need to pay special attention if you want to use OCaml serialization functions (module Marshal, functions input_value/output_value) on x-values. In addition to your values, you also need to save and restore some piece of internal data using the functions Cduce_types.Value.extract_all and Cduce_types.Value.intract_all. Of course, this also applies if the value to be serialized contains deeply nested x-values.

Here are generic serialization/deserializations functions that illustrate how to do it:

let my_output_value oc v =
  let p = Cduce_types.Value.extract_all () in
  output_value oc (p,v)

let my_input_value ic =
  let (p,v) = input_value ic in
  Cduce_types.Value.intract_all p;
  v

Performance

Strings

OCaml users might be surprised by the fact that x-strings are simply represented as sequences in OCamlDuce. Does this mean that they are actually stored in memory as linked list? Certainly not! The internal representation of sequence values uses several tricks to improve performance and memory usage. In particular, a special form in the representation can store strings as byte buffers, as in OCaml. It an XML document is loaded, or if a Caml string is converted to an x-value, this compact representation will be used.

Concatenation

Similarly, OCaml users might be relectutant to use the sequence concatenation @ on sequences. In OCaml, the complexity of this operator is linear in the size of its first argument (which need to be copied). OCamlDuce use a special form in its internal representation to store concatenation in a lazy way. The concatenation will really by computed only when the value is accessed. This means that it's perfectly ok to build a long sequence by adding new elements at the end one by one, as long as you don't simultaneously inspect the sequence.

Pattern matching

Another point which is worth knowing when programming in OCamlDuce is that patterns can be written in a declarative style without affective performance. The compiler uses static type information about matched values to produce efficient code for pattern matching. To illustrate this, consider the following sample:

x.ml:

type a = {{ <a>[ a* ] }}
type b = {{ <b>[ b* ] }}

let f : {{ a|b }} -> int = function {{ a }} -> 0 | {{ _ }} -> 1
y.ml:

type a = {{ <a>[ a* ] }}
type b = {{ <b>[ b* ] }}

let f : {{ a|b }} -> int = function {{ <a>_ }} -> 0 | {{ _ }} -> 1

The two functions have exactly the same semantics, but the first implementation is more declarative: it uses type checks to distinguish between a and b instead of saying how to distinguish between these two types. Imagine that the definition of these types change to:

type a = {{ <x kind="a">[ a* ] }}
type b = {{ <x kind="b">[ b* ] }}

Then the first implementation still works as expected, but the second one needs to be rewritten.

Now one might believe that the second implementation is more efficient because it tells the compiler to check only the root tag, whereas the first implementation would force the compiler to produce code to check that all tags in the tree are as. But this is not what happens! Actually, you can check that the compiler will produce exactly the same code for both implementations. It considers the static type information about the argument of the pattern matching (here, the input type of the function), and computes an efficient way to evaluate patterns for the values of this type.

The map iterator

The map ... with ... iterator is implemented in a tail-recursive way. You can safely use it on very long sequences.

OCaml and OCamlDuce

Since the 3.08.4 release, OCamlDuce is binary compatible with the corresponding OCaml release. This means that OCamlDuce can use OCaml-generated .cmi files and that it produces an OCaml-compatible .cmi file if the interface does not use any x-type (this file is equal to what would have been obtained by using OCaml).

It is thus possible to use existing libraries which were compiled for OCaml. It is also possible to use OCamlDuce to compile some modules and use them in an OCaml project provided their interface is pure OCaml.