Concrete Search with Abstract Matching and Refinement

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Authors

PELÁNEK Radek PASAREANU Corina VISSER Willem

Year of publication 2005
Type Article in Proceedings
Conference Computer Aided Verification
MU Faculty or unit

Faculty of Informatics

Citation
Field Informatics
Keywords model checking; predicate abstraction; under-approximation
Description We propose an abstraction-based model checking method which relies on refinement of an under-approximation of the feasible behaviors of the system under analysis. The method preserves errors to safety properties, since all analyzed behaviors are feasible by definition. The method does not require an abstract transition relation to be generated, but instead executes the concrete transitions while storing abstract versions of the concrete states, as specified by a set of abstraction predicates. For each explored transition the method checks, with the help of a theorem prover, whether there is any loss of precision introduced by abstraction. The results of these checks are used to decide termination or to refine the abstraction by generating new abstraction predicates. If the (possibly infinite) concrete system under analysis has a finite bisimulation quotient, then the method is guaranteed to eventually explore an equivalent finite bisimilar structure. We illustrate the application of the approach for checking concurrent programs. We also show how a lightweight variant can be used for efficient software testing.
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