This is the final post in our simproc series. In our first two posts, we gave an informal introduction to the concept of a simproc, and a brief overview of the inner workings of the simp tactic. The aim of this final post is to build on this by demonstrating how Lean users can write their own simprocs.

As for the previous post, we will assume that the reader has some exposure to metaprogramming in Lean. In addition, some familiarity with the Qq library will be helpful, but not necessary for most of this post.

First, we will take a look at the syntax and general structure of a simproc. Then, we will walk through an explicit example of a simproc for a simple custom function, and explore various possible implementations.

The simproc syntax

Let's see how to declare a simproc.

The basic syntax for declaring a simproc is

simproc_decl mySimproc (theExprToMatch _ _) := fun e ↦ do
  write_simproc_here

See the next section for how to actually replace write_simproc_here by the correct meta code.

To add mySimproc to the standard simp set, replace simproc_decl by simproc:

simproc mySimproc (theExprToMatch _ _) := fun e ↦ do
  write_simproc_here

When calling a simproc in simp (if it is not in the standard simp set), one can specify that this is a preprocedure by adding ↓ in front of the simproc identifier: simp [↓mySimproc]. (Note that this also works when passing lemmas to simp!)

To add mySimproc to the standard simp set as a preprocedure (recall that postprocedure is the default), do

simproc ↓ mySimproc (theExprToMatch _ _) := fun e ↦ do
  write_simproc_here

Note that being a pre/postprocedure is a property of simprocs in a simp set, not of bare simprocs. Therefore, there is no corresponding simproc_decl ↓ syntax.

Simproc walkthrough

Let's write a simproc for a simple recursive function. We choose a custom function revRange, which to a natural number n returns the list of the first n natural numbers in decreasing order:

def revRange : Nat → List Nat
  | 0     => []
  | n + 1 => n :: revRange n

#eval revRange 5 -- [4, 3, 2, 1, 0]

Our goal will be to make simp evaluate revRange when its input is an explicit numeral, eg

example : revRange 0 = [] := by simp [???]
example : revRange 2 = [1, 0] := by simp [???]
example : revRange 5 = [4, 3, 2, 1, 0] := by simp [???]

Note two features of revRange that one should not expect from all functions that one might want to evaluate on explicit inputs:

• It is recursive: One can compute revRange n by recursion on n. Even more precisely, revRange n represents its own partial computation.
• revRange is definitionally equal to what we want to unfold it to. This has two consequences:
• The two examples in the code snippet above can be proved by rfl, but of course doing so defeats the point of this blogpost.
• We could actually write a dsimproc for revRange, which is to dsimp what a simproc is to simp (see the Simprocs section of the second blog post). Implementation-wise, the main difference is that a dsimproc requires the new simplified expression to be definitionally equal to the previous one.

Let's now present three approaches to evaluating revRange on numerals:

• The baseline simproc-less approach which only uses lemmas and no simproc.
• The dsimproc approach, where we (possibly recursively) construct in the meta world the evaluated expression, but leave the proof to be rfl (here the "d" stands for "definitional equality").
• The simproc approach, where we (possibly recursively) construct the evaluated expression and the proof simultaneously.

The simproc-less approach

Before writing a simproc, let us first see how one could approach the computation of revRange using only lemmas.

revRange is a recursive function. Therefore it can be evaluated on numerals simply by writing out the recurrence relations we wish to reduce along:

lemma revRange_zero : revRange 0 = [] := rfl
lemma revRange_succ (n : Nat) : revRange (n + 1) = n :: revRange n := rfl

Then we can complete our code snippet like so:

example : revRange 0 = [] := by simp [revRange_zero, revRange_succ]
example : revRange 2 = [1, 0] := by simp [revRange_zero, revRange_succ]
example : revRange 5 = [4, 3, 2, 1, 0] := by simp [revRange_zero, revRange_succ]

Note: Since revRange is defined by recursion, simp [revRange] would also be a valid proof here. But we are trying not to rely on the definition of revRange.

Pros:

• Doesn't require writing any meta code.
• Doesn't require the recursion relations to be definitional (although they are in the case of revRange).

Cons:

• Requires adding two lemmas to your simp call instead of one (assuming we do not want these lemmas in the default simp set).
• Simplifying revRange n for a big input numeral n might involve a lot of simplification steps. In this specific case, the number of simplification steps is linear in n. Simplification steps matter because each one increases the size of the proof term.
• revRange n could find itself (partially) evaluated even if n isn't a numeral. Eg simp [revRange_zero, revRange_succ] on ⊢ revRange (n + 3) = revRange (3 + n) will result in ⊢ n + 2 :: n + 1 :: n :: revRange n = revRange (3 + n). This is in general highly undesirable.

The definitional approach

In cases where the evaluation is definitionally equal to the original expression, one may write a dsimproc instead of a simproc. The syntax to declare a dsimproc is rather similar to simprocs, with a small difference: we now need to return a DStep instead of a Step; in practice this amounts to providing the expression our program has produced without providing the proof (indeed, the proof is just rfl!)

To compute revRange using the dsimproc approach, we can do the following:

dsimproc_decl revRangeCompute (revRange _) := fun e => do
  -- Extract the natural number from the expression
  let_expr revRange m ← e | return .continue
  -- Recover the natural number as a term of type `Nat`
  let some n := m.nat? | return .continue
  let l := revRange n
  -- Convert the list to an `Expr`
  let l_expr := Lean.toExpr l
  return .visit l_expr

Why does this work? One key step here is happening on the line let l_expr := Lean.toExpr l. Generally speaking, Lean.toExpr can be thought of as a function that produces Exprs for sufficiently simple objects, in this case natural number literals and explicit lists of such terms.

Here, this takes an explicit list of natural numbers of the form a :: b :: ... :: [] and produces the expression corresponding to this list recursively, by sending [] to Expr.app (Expr.const [] `List.nil) (Expr.const [] `Nat) and a :: l to Expr.app (Expr.app (Expr.app (Expr.const [] `List.cons) (Expr.const [] `Nat)) (Lean.toExpr a)) (Lean.toExpr l); and the computation of Lean.toExpr for a natural number literal a works in a similar recursive manner.

Applying this to revRange produces precisely the expression we wanted, i.e. writing the expression for revRange n as a series of applications of List.cons starting from List.nil. There are other ways of achieving the same result: for example, one can use the function Lean.Meta.whnf, which takes in an expression e and produces a new simplified expression e' that is definitionally equal to e.

There are other stronger variants of this function such as Lean.Meta.reduce and Lean.Meta.reduceAll. In particular, reduce and reduceAll are both able to produce the desired expression here.

open Qq in
run_meta do
  let listExpr : Q(List Nat) := q(revRange 5)
  let listExprSimplified ← reduce listExpr
  Lean.logInfo m!"{listExprSimplified} --[4, 3, 2, 1, 0]

A slightly different version of the dsimproc above using reduce is the following:

dsimproc_decl revRangeCompute (revRange _) := fun e => do
  -- Extract the natural number from the expression
  let_expr revRange m ← e | return .continue
  -- If `m` isn't a natural number literal then we do nothing
  unless (m.nat?).isSome do return .continue
  -- Use `whnf` to simplify the expression `e`.
  return .visit <| ← reduce e

For a bit more on dsimprocs, see the extras below.

Pros:

• Requires writing a single simproc.
• Assuming the type of the expression to be evaluated implements ToExpr, there is no need to reevaluate the expression manually in the meta world.

Cons:

• The function needs to be computable to be evaluated automatically in the meta world.
• The produced rfl proof could be a "heavy rfl", requiring a long time to check in the kernel.
• Only works when the evaluation and conversion back to an expression is definitionally equal to the original expression.

The propositional approach

A more general approach would be to manually construct the proof term we need to provide. In our case, we can do this in a recursive manner.

open Qq

private theorem revRange_succ_eq_of_revRange_eq {n : ℕ} {l : List ℕ}
    (hl : revRange n = l) : revRange (n+1) = n :: l := by
  induction n with
  | zero => aesop
  | succ n h => rw [←hl]; rfl

open Qq in
simproc_decl revRangeComputeProp (revRange _) := fun e => do
  let_expr revRange m ← e | return .continue
  let some n ← Nat.fromExpr? m | return .continue
  let rec go (n : ℕ) : (l : Q(List ℕ)) × Q(revRange $n = $l) :=
    match n with
    | 0 => ⟨q(([] : List ℕ)), q(revRange_zero)⟩
    | n + 1 =>
      let ⟨l, pf⟩ := go n
      ⟨q($n :: $l), q(revRange_succ_eq_of_revRange_eq $pf)⟩
  let ⟨l, pf⟩ := go n
  return .visit { expr := l, proof? := pf }

Pros:

• Works regardless of definitional equalities. See Nat.reduceDvd introduced in the previous blog post for another compelling example: a ∣ b is not defined as a % b = 0, yet the Nat.reduceDvd simproc can decide a ∣ b by computing a % b = 0.

Cons:

• Might involve a fair bit of meta code, a lot of which could feel like evaluating the function.
• Simplifying revRange n for a big input numeral n might produce a large proof term. In this specific case, the size of the produced proof term will be linear in n.

What should be a simproc?

There is one question that so far has been left untouched: when should a metaprogram be a simproc? To an extent, this boundary is perhaps not a strict one, and we do not aim to provide a definitive answer, but rather provide the reader with a few guiding principles. As we saw in the first post, simprocs can be thought of as "parametric simp lemmas" where the right hand side is allowed to vary as a function of the left hand side.

Thus, the niche that simprocs are designed to occupy is that of metaprograms that implement a given simplification procedure taking an expression and replacing it by a normal form that can be further simplified by simp. In particular, simprocs are meant to perform small steps fitting into a larger simplification algorithm, rather than provide general purpose automation.

For example, evaluating some concrete function foo : Nat → Nat at explicit inputs (i.e. literals) n falls well within this niche, while finding contradictions in general linear inequality systems might be better left to a bespoke tactic (and indeed, this is precisely what linarith does!).

Epilogue

In the series of blog posts, we gave an overview of the role simprocs are meant to play in Lean's theorem proving framework, took a brief look at the internals of the simp tactic, implemented a few simprocs to solve a concrete problem, and briefly discussed what problems simprocs are meant to solve. Our hope is that, equipped with the basic tools needed to write their own simprocs when needed, the reader will be able to use them freely in their own formalisation work and contributions to the Lean ecosystem!

Extras

How to discharge subgoals

Often, when applying a theorem, we may need to provide additional proof terms for the hypotheses of the result. One useful feature of simprocs is that we can also call the discharger tactic provided to simp. Which discharger was provided by the user is part of the state stored by the SimpM monad, and can be accessed by the tactic via Methods.

Roughly speaking, Methods is the part of the SimpM monad that encodes which methods simp can use to simplify an expression. Methods implements a function discharge? : Expr → Option Expr such that discharge? goal is equal to some pf if the discharger found a proof pf of goal, and none otherwise. Finally, to access the current local value of Methods, one can use getMethods.

In the following example, we implement a simproc for Nat.factorization that simplifies expressions of the form (a * b).factorization to a.factorization + b.factorization whenever a proof that a and b are both non-zero can be found by the discharger.

import Mathlib

open Qq Lean.Meta.Simp

simproc_decl factorizationMul (Nat.factorization (_ * _)) := .ofQ fun u α e => do
  match u, α, e with
  | 1, ~q(ℕ →₀ ℕ), ~q(Nat.factorization ($a * $b)) =>
    -- Try to discharge the goal `a ≠ 0`
    let some ha ← ((← getMethods).discharge? q($a ≠ 0)) | return .continue
    --Convert the resulting proof to a `Qq` expression for convenience (see #23510)
    let ⟨0, ~q($a ≠ 0), ~q($ha)⟩ ← inferTypeQ ha | return .continue
    -- Try to discharge the goal `b ≠ 0`
    let some hb ← ((← getMethods).discharge? q($b ≠ 0)) | return .continue
    --Convert the resulting proof to a `Qq` expression for convenience
    let ⟨0, ~q($b ≠ 0), ~q($hb)⟩ ← inferTypeQ hb | return .continue
    let e' := q((Nat.factorization $a) + (Nat.factorization $b))
    let pf := q(Nat.factorization_mul $ha $hb)
    return .visit { expr := e', proof? := pf }
  | _, _, _ => return .continue

set_option trace.Meta.Tactic.simp true in
example : Nat.factorization (2 * 3) = fun₀ | 2 => 1 | 3 => 1 := by
  simp (disch := decide) only [factorizationMul]
  guard_target = Nat.factorization 2 + Nat.factorization 3 = fun₀ | 2 => 1 | 3 => 1
  sorry

How to match on numerals

Often when writing a simproc to perform a computation, it can be useful to extract quantities from the expression we are manipulating. The easiest case is perhaps that of Nat literals -- recall that we had to do this several times when implementing the simprocs above! Given a numeral by e : Expr, there are various ways of recovering the corresponding term of type Nat:

• Lean.Expr.rawNatLit? Returns n if the expression e is of the form Expr.lit (Literal.natVal n), and none otherwise.
• Lean.Expr.natLit!: Similar to the above, but panics if e is not of the form Expr.lit (Literal.natVal n).
• Lean.Expr.nat?: Extracts n if the expression e corresponds to OfNat.ofNat m where m corresponds to Expr.lit (Literal.natVal n).
• Nat.fromExpr?: Combination of the above that also strips metadata from e beforehand.

Some of these are more restrictive than others, and generally speaking, the two last ones are those that show up the most in practise. Given an expression e representing a natural number, a little pre-processing can occasionally be necessary in order to put e in a form where the number can be extracted. For example, if e represents OfNat.ofNat a + OfNat.ofNat b where a and b are explicit natural numbers then all of the methods above will fail to extract the number a + b, as e is not of the form OfNat.ofNat _.

-- no pre-processing
run_meta do
  let a : Q(Nat) := q(1 + 1)
  Lean.logInfo m!"{Expr.nat? a}" -- none

-- with some pre-processing
run_meta do -- 3
  let a : Q(Nat) := q(2 + 1)
  -- The expression is of the form `HAdd.hAdd (OfNat.ofNat x) (OfNat.ofNat y)`
  let_expr HAdd.hAdd _ _ _ _ x y ← a | return
  let some vx := Expr.nat? x | return
  let some vy := Expr.nat? y | return
  Lean.logInfo m!"{vx + vy}" -- 3

Exercise: write a function extractNat? (e : Expr) : MetaM (Option Nat) that extracts the value of e whenever e is of the form OfNat.ofNat x (or a combination of such values, using the operations +, -, *, /).