Article · Wikipedia archive · Last revised May 27, 2026

UNITY (programming language)

UNITY is a programming language constructed by K. Mani Chandy and Jayadev Misra for their book Parallel Program Design: A Foundation. It is a theoretical language which focuses on what, instead of where, when or how. The language contains no method of flow control, and program statements run in a nondeterministic way until statements cease to cause changes during execution. This allows for programs to run indefinitely, such as auto-pilot or power plant safety systems, as well as programs that would normally terminate.

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UNITY is a programming language constructed by K. Mani Chandy and Jayadev Misra for their book Parallel Program Design: A Foundation. It is a theoretical language which focuses on what, instead of where, when or how. The language contains no method of flow control, and program statements run in a nondeterministic way until statements cease to cause changes during execution. This allows for programs to run indefinitely, such as auto-pilot or power plant safety systems, as well as programs that would normally terminate (which here converge to a fixed point).

Description

All statements are assignments, and are separated by #. A statement can consist of multiple assignments, of the form a,b,c := x,y,z, or a := x || b := y || c := z. You can also have a quantified statement list, <# x,y : expression :: statement>, where x and y are chosen randomly among the values that satisfy expression. A quantified assignment is similar. In <|| x,y : expression :: statement >, statement is executed simultaneously for all pairs of x and y that satisfy expression.

Examples

Bubble sort

Bubble sort the array by comparing adjacent numbers, and swapping them if they are in the wrong order. Using Θ ( n ) {\displaystyle \Theta (n)} expected time, Θ ( n ) {\displaystyle \Theta (n)} processors and Θ ( n 2 ) {\displaystyle \Theta (n^{2})} expected work. The reason you only have Θ ( n ) {\displaystyle \Theta (n)} expected time, is that k is always chosen randomly from { 0 , 1 } {\displaystyle \{0,1\}} . This can be fixed by flipping k manually.

Program bubblesort
declare
    n: integer,
    A: array [0..n-1] of integer
initially
    n = 20 #
    <|| i : 0 <= i and i < n :: A[i] = rand() % 100 >
assign
    <# k : 0 <= k < 2 ::
        <|| i : i % 2 = k and 0 <= i < n - 1 ::
            A[i], A[i+1] := A[i+1], A[i] 
                if A[i] > A[i+1] > >
end

Rank-sort

You can sort in Θ ( log n ) {\displaystyle \Theta (\log n)} time with rank-sort. You need Θ ( n 2 ) {\displaystyle \Theta (n^{2})} processors, and do Θ ( n 2 ) {\displaystyle \Theta (n^{2})} work.

Program ranksort
declare
    n: integer,
    A,R: array [0..n-1] of integer
initially
    n = 15 #
    <|| i : 0 <= i < n :: 
        A[i], R[i] = rand() % 100, i >
assign
    <|| i : 0 <= i < n ::
        R[i] := <+ j : 0 <= j < n and (A[j] < A[i] or (A[j] = A[i] and j < i)) :: 1 > >
    #
    <|| i : 0 <= i < n ::
        A[R[i]] := A[i] >
end

Floyd–Warshall algorithm

Using the Floyd–Warshall algorithm all pairs shortest path algorithm, we include intermediate nodes iteratively, and get Θ ( n ) {\displaystyle \Theta (n)} time, using Θ ( n 2 ) {\displaystyle \Theta (n^{2})} processors and Θ ( n 3 ) {\displaystyle \Theta (n^{3})} work.

Program shortestpath
declare
    n,k: integer,
    D: array [0..n-1, 0..n-1] of integer
initially
    n = 10 #
    k = 0 #
    <|| i,j : 0 <= i < n and 0 <= j < n :: 
        D[i,j] = rand() % 100 >
assign
    <|| i,j : 0 <= i < n and 0 <= j < n ::
        D[i,j] := min(D[i,j], D[i,k] + D[k,j]) > ||
    k := k + 1 if k < n - 1
end

We can do this even faster. The following programs computes all pairs shortest path in Θ ( log 2 n ) {\displaystyle \Theta (\log ^{2}n)} time, using Θ ( n 3 ) {\displaystyle \Theta (n^{3})} processors and Θ ( n 3 log n ) {\displaystyle \Theta (n^{3}\log n)} work.

Program shortestpath2
declare
    n: integer,
    D: array [0..n-1, 0..n-1] of integer
initially
    n = 10 #
    <|| i,j : 0 <= i < n and 0 <= j < n ::
        D[i,j] = rand() % 10 >
assign
    <|| i,j : 0 <= i < n and 0 <= j < n ::
        D[i,j] := min(D[i,j], <min k : 0 <= k < n :: D[i,k] + D[k,j] >) >
end

After round r {\displaystyle r} , D[i,j] contains the length of the shortest path from i {\displaystyle i} to j {\displaystyle j} of length 0 r {\displaystyle 0\dots r} . In the next round, of length 0 2 r {\displaystyle 0\dots 2r} , and so on.

References

References

  • K. Mani Chandy and Jayadev Misra (1988) Parallel Program Design: A Foundation.using UnityEngine;

public class CarController : MonoBehaviour {

   public float speed = 10f;
   public float turnSpeed = 50f;
   void Update()
   {
       float move = Input.GetAxis("Vertical") * speed * Time.deltaTime;
       float turn = Input.GetAxis("Horizontal") * turnSpeed * Time.deltaTime;
       transform.Translate(0, 0, move);
       transform.Rotate(0, turn, 0);
   }

}