Publications

Selected Recent Publications

Smarter Contract Upgrades with Orthogonal Persistence

Luc Bläser, Claudio Russo, Gabor Greif, Ryan Vandersmith, and Jason Ibrahim.

16th ACM SIGPLAN International Workshop on Virtual Machines and Intermediate Languages (VMIL) at SPLASH 2024, Pasadena, CA, USA, October 2024

This paper presents enhanced orthogonal persistence mechanisms for smart contracts on the Internet Computer blockchain, enabling smarter contract upgrades with transparent state management and improved developer experience.

PDF ACM Digital Library Video Presentation

Collecting Garbage on the Blockchain

Luc Bläser, Claudio Russo, Ulan Degenbaev, Ömer Ağacan, Gabor Greif, and Jason Ibrahim.

15th ACM SIGPLAN International Workshop on Virtual Machines and Intermediate Languages (VMIL) at SPLASH 2023, Cascais, Portugal, October 2023

Presents an incremental garbage collection algorithm designed specifically for blockchain environments, addressing the unique challenges of deterministic execution and limited computation cycles in smart contracts.

PDF ACM Digital Library Video Presentation

Books & Monographs

  • Modern Runtime System and Compiler Design. Luc Bläser. ISBN 978-3-033-08044-7. Independently Published, January 2021.
    Website
  • A Component Language for Pointer-Free Concurrent Programming and its Application to Simulation. Luc Bläser. ETH Dissertation No. 17480, ETH Zürich, November 2007.
    PDF

Conference & Workshop Papers

  • Luc Bläser, Claudio Russo et al.Smarter Contract Upgrades with Orthogonal Persistence. 16th ACM SIGPLAN International Workshop on Virtual Machines and Intermediate Languages (VMIL) at SPLASH 2024, Pasadena, CA, USA, October 2024. PDF ACM DL
  • Luc Bläser, Claudio Russo, Ulan Degenbaev et al.Collecting Garbage on the Blockchain. 15th ACM SIGPLAN International Workshop on Virtual Machines and Intermediate Languages (VMIL) at SPLASH 2023, Cascais, Portugal, October 2023. PDF ACM DL
  • Christoph Amrein and Luc Bläser. A Refactoring Tool for the Safe Parallelization of Array-Centric For-Loops. Kolloquium für Programmiersprachen und Grundlagen der Programmierung (KPS), Baiersbronn, Germany, September 2019. PDF
  • Luc Bläser. Practical Detection of Concurrency Issues at Coding Time. International Symposium on Software Testing and Analysis (ISSTA) 2018, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, July 2018. PDF
  • Micha Reiser and Luc Bläser. Accelerate JavaScript Applications by Cross-Compiling to WebAssembly. 9th ACM SIGPLAN International Workshop on Virtual Machines and Intermediate Languages (VMIL) at SPLASH 2017, Vancouver, Canada, October 2017. PDF
  • Philip Kramer, Daniel Egloff, and Luc Bläser. The Alea Reactive Dataflow System for GPU Parallelization. HLGPU 2016 Workshop at HiPEAC 2016, Prague, Czech Republic, 2016. PDF
  • Luc Bläser, Daniel Egloff, Philip Kramer et al. Alea Reactive Dataflow: GPU Parallelization Made Simple. Kolloquium für Programmiersprachen und Grundlagen der Programmierung (KPS) 2015, Pörtschach am Wörthersee, Austria, October 2015. PDF
  • Luc Bläser. Task Parallelization as a Service: A Runtime System for Automatic Shared Task Distribution. Eighth Workshop on Programmability Issues for Heterogeneous Multicores (MULTIPROG-2015) at HiPEAC 2015, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, January 2015. PDF
  • Luc Bläser, D. Egloff, P. Kramer et al. Alea Reactive Dataflow: GPU Parallelization Made Simple. Workshop on Reactive and Event-based Languages & Systems (REBLS'14) at SPLASH 2014, Portland, OR, USA, October 2014. PDF
  • Luc Bläser. Composita: Bringing Order to Agent Communications. International Workshop on Programming based on Actors, Agents, and Decentralized Control (AGERE14) at SPLASH 2014, Portland, OR, USA, October 2014. PDF
  • Luc Bläser. .NET Task Parallelization in the Cloud: Runtime Support for Seamless Distribution of Shared Memory Parallel Tasks. 4th Workshop on Systems for Future Multicore Architectures (SMFA'14) at EuroSys 2014, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, April 2014. PDF
  • Luc Bläser and Jürg Gutknecht. COMPOSITA: A Study in Runtime Architecture for Massively Parallel Systems. Kolloquium für Programmiersprachen und Grundlagen der Programmierung (KPS), Wittenberg, Germany, October 2013. PDF
  • Luc Bläser. Persistent Oberon: A Programming Language with Integrated Persistence. Asian Symposium on Programming Languages and Systems (APLAS) 2007, Singapore, Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer, October 2007. PDF
  • Luc Bläser. How Can We Liberate Ourselves From Pointers? International Conference on Object Oriented Programming Systems Languages and Applications (OOPSLA) 2007, Montreal, Canada, October 2007. PDF
  • Luc Bläser. A High-Performance Operating System for Structured Concurrent Programs. Workshop on Programming Languages and Operating Systems (PLOS) 2007, Stevenson WA, USA, October 2007. PDF
  • Luc Bläser. A Component-Oriented Language for Pointer-Free Parallel Programming. Kolloquium Programmiersprachen und Grundlagen der Programmierung (KPS) 2007, Timmendorfer Strand, Germany, October 2007. PDF
  • Luc Bläser. A Programming Language with Natural Persistence. International Conference on Object Oriented Programming Systems Languages and Applications (OOPSLA) 2006, Portland OR, USA, October 2006. PDF
  • Luc Bläser. A Component Language for Structured Parallel Programming. Joint Modular Languages Conference (JMLC) 2006, Oxford, UK, Lecture Notes in Computer Science 4228, Springer, September 2006. PDF

Selected Talks & Presentations

  • Sep. 2025 - CV Summit 2025, Hello, Self-Writing Internet: From Ideas to Apps. AI Stage, Zurich, Switzerland.
  • Jun. 2025 - Cybersecurity and Privacy (CySeP) Summer School, A Programming Language Designed for Secure Smart Contract Programming. KTH Stockholm, Sweden. Slides
  • Oct. 2024 - International Workshop on Virtual Machines and Intermediate Languages (VMIL) at SPLASH 2024, Smarter Contract Upgrades with Orthogonal Persistence. Pasadena, CA, USA. Video
  • Jun. 2024 - Cybersecurity and Privacy (CySeP) Summer School, Powerful Blockchain Programming on the Internet Computer. KTH Stockholm, Sweden. Slides
  • Oct. 2023 - International Workshop on Virtual Machines and Intermediate Languages (VMIL) at SPLASH 2023, Collecting Garbage on the Blockchain. Cascais, Portugal. Video
  • Jun. 2023 - Cybersecurity and Privacy (CySeP) Summer School, Motoko - The Programming Language of the Internet Computer. KTH Stockholm, Sweden. Slides
  • Sep. 2021 - Kolloquium für Programmiersprachen und Grundlagen der Programmierung (KPS), Parallel Helper: Detecting Concurrency Bug Patterns. Kiel, Germany. Slides
  • Sep. 2019 - Kolloquium für Programmiersprachen und Grundlagen der Programmierung (KPS), Fast and Precise Detection of Data Races at Development Time. Baiersbronn, Germany. Slides
  • Jul. 2018 - International Symposium on Software Testing and Analysis (ISSTA) 2018, Practical Detection of Concurrency Issues at Coding Time. Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Slides
  • Jul. 2018 - Workshop on Introspective Systems for Automatically Generating Tests (ISAGT) 2018 at ECOOP 2018, Checking Non-Deterministic Behavior in Unit Tests. Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Slides
  • Mar. 2018 - Parallel 2018 Conference, Parallel without Locks: What applies to .NET and what to Java? Heidelberg, Germany. Slides
  • Mar. 2017 - Parallel 2017 Conference, Fighting Concurrency Errors in C#. Heidelberg, Germany. Slides
  • Feb. 2017 - Multicore@Siemens Conference, Parallel Code Smells: A Top 10 List. Nuremberg, Germany. Slides
  • Jan. 2017 - OOP 2017 Conference, Parallel Code Smells: A Top 10 List. Munich, Germany. Slides
  • Apr. 2016 - Parallel 2016 Conference, Parallel Code Smells. Heidelberg, Germany. Slides
  • Oct. 2015 - Kolloquium für Programmiersprachen und Grundlagen der Programmierung (KPS), Radically Simplified GPU Parallelization. Pörtschach am Wörthersee, Austria. Slides
  • Apr. 2015 - Parallel 2015 Conference, Task Parallel Library Rundtour. Karlsruhe, Germany. Slides
  • Mar. 2015 - GPU Technology Conference (GTC) 2015, Radically Simplified GPU Parallelization. San Jose, CA, USA. Slides
  • Feb. 2015 - Multicore@Siemens Conference, Various Faces of Task Parallel Library. Nuremberg, Germany. Slides
  • Jan. 2015 - Eighth Workshop on Programmability Issues for Heterogeneous Multicores (MULTIPROG-2015) at HiPEAC 2015, .NET Task Parallelization As A Service. Amsterdam, The Netherlands. Slides
  • Oct. 2014 - Workshop on Reactive and Event-based Languages & Systems (REBLS'14) at SPLASH 2014, Alea Reactive Dataflow. Portland, OR, USA. Slides
  • Oct. 2014 - International Workshop on Programming based on Actors, Agents, and Decentralized Control (AGERE14) at SPLASH 2014, Composita. Portland, OR, USA. Slides
  • Sep. 2014 - F# Users Meetup, Simplified GPU Programming. Zurich, Switzerland. Slides
  • May 2014 - Parallel 2014 Conference (2 talks and 1 tutorial), Karlsruhe, Germany. Talk 1 Talk 2
  • Apr. 2014 - Workshop on Systems for Future Multicore Architectures (SMFA'14) at EuroSys 2014, .NET Task Parallelization Cloud. Amsterdam, Netherlands. Slides
  • Oct. 2013 - Colloquium at Varian Medical Systems, Concurrency in Software Design. Baden, Switzerland. Slides
  • Oct. 2013 - Kolloquium für Programmiersprachen und Grundlagen der Programmierung (KPS), Composita Study. Wittenberg, Germany. Slides
  • May 2013 - Parallel 2013 Conference (2 talks), Karlsruhe, Germany. Talk 1 Talk 2
  • Apr. 2013 - ETH Zurich, Seminar of Sociology, in particular of Modeling and Simulation, Language Runtime Innovations Distribution. Zurich, Switzerland. Slides
  • Jan. 2009 - TU Darmstadt, Department of Computer Science, Component Language. Darmstadt, Germany. Slides
  • Sep. 2008 - Microsoft Research and Microsoft Development CSA (2 talks), Component Language. Redmond WA, USA. Slides
  • Jun. 2008 - TU Berlin, Seminar for Traffic Simulation, Laufzeitsystem parallele Simulation. Berlin, Germany. Slides
  • Nov. 2007 - Asian Symposium on Programming Languages and Systems (APLAS), Persistent Oberon. Singapore. Slides
  • Oct. 2007 - Workshop on Programming Languages and Operating Systems (PLOS), High Performance Operating System. Stevenson, WA, USA. Slides
  • Oct. 2007 - Kolloquium Programmiersprachen und Grundlagen der Programmierung (KPS), Komponentenorientierte Sprache. Timmendorfer Strand, Germany. Slides
  • May 2007 - TU Berlin, Seminar for Traffic Simulation, Simulationsstudie. Berlin, Germany. Slides
  • Sep. 2006 - Joint Modular Languages Conference (JMLC), Component Language. Oxford, England, UK. Slides
  • Sep. 2005 - Lightning Talk at International Conference on Object-Oriented Systems Languages and Applications (OOPSLA), Persistence Lightning Talk. San Diego, CA, USA. Slides
  • Jun. 2004 - International Oberon Day, Persistence Talk. Basel, Switzerland. Slides

Professional Service

Leadership Roles

  • President, SI-SE: Software Engineering Special Interest Group, Swiss Informatics Society (SI), 2019-2022. Executive Board 2015-2022.
  • Swiss ICT Master Commission Representative, FHO University of Applied Sciences of Eastern Switzerland, 2017-2019.

Program Committee Memberships

  • Parallel 2019 Conference, Heidelberg, Germany, February 2019
  • 23rd SI-SE Fachtagung, Zürich, Switzerland, June 2018
  • Parallel 2018 Conference, Heidelberg, Germany, March 2018
  • ITG Fachtagung, Fehraltdorf, Switzerland, November 2017
  • 22nd SI-SE Fachtagung, Zürich, Switzerland, June 2017
  • Parallel 2017 Conference, Heidelberg, Germany, March 2017
  • ITG Fachtagung, Fehraltdorf, Switzerland, November 2016
  • 16th IEEE International Conference on Scalable Computing and Communications, Toulouse, France, July 2016
  • 21st SI-SE Fachtagung, Zürich, Switzerland, June 2016
  • Parallel 2016 Conference, Heidelberg, Germany, April 2016
  • Parallel 2015 Conference, Karlsruhe, Germany, April 2015
  • Parallel 2014 Conference, Karlsruhe, Germany, April 2014