Source : Free On-Line Dictionary of Computing

Categorical Abstract Machine Language
     
         (Originally "CAML" - Categorical Abstract Machine
        Language) A version of {ML} by G. Huet, G. Cousineau, Ascander
        Suarez, Pierre Weis, Michel Mauny and others of {INRIA} and
        {ENS}. CAML is intermediate between {LCF ML} and {SML}
        [in what sense?].
        It has {first-class} functions, {static type inference} with
        {polymorphic} types, user-defined {variant types} and {product
        types}, and {pattern matching}.  It is built on a proprietary
        run-time system.
     
        The CAML V3.1 implementation added {lazy} and {mutable} data
        structures, a "{grammar}" mechanism for interfacing with the
        {Yacc} {parser generator}, {pretty-printing} tools,
        high-performance {arbitrary-precision} arithmetic, and a
        complete library. CAML V3 is often nicknamed "heavy CAML",
        because of its heavy memory and CPU requirements compared to
        {Caml Light}.
     
        in 1990 Xavier Leroy and Damien Doligez designed a new
        implementation called {Caml Light}, freeing the previous
        implementation from too many experimental high-level features,
        and more importantly, from the old Le_Lisp back-end.
     
        Following the addition of a {native-code} compiler and a
        powerful {module} system in 1995 and of the {object} and
        {class} layer in 1996, the project's name was changed to
        {Objective Caml}.
     
        ["The CAML Reference Manual", P. Weis et al, TR INRIA-ENS,
        1989].
     
        (2003-04-12)