EmergenTheta: Verification Beyond Abstraction Refinement (SV-COMP Competition Contribution)

Theta is a model checking framework conventionally based on abstraction refinement techniques. While abstraction is useful for a large number of verification problems, the over-reliance on the technique led to Theta being unable to meaningfully adapt. Identifying this problem in previous years of SV-COMP has led us to create EmergenTheta, a sandbox for the new approaches we want Theta to support. By differentiating between mature and emerging techniques, we can experiment more freely without hurting the reliability of the overall framework. In this paper we detail the development route to EmergenTheta, and its first debut on SV-COMP’24 in the ReachSafety category.

Transcript

1. EmergenTheta: Verification Beyond Abstraction Refinement SV-COMP 2024 Levente Bajczi, Dániel Szekeres, Milán Mondok, Zsófia Ádám, Márk Somorjai, Csanád Telbisz, Mihály Dobos-Kovács and Vince Molnár
2. Generic, modular and configurable model checking framework But CEGAR only – can not adapt to everything Goal: add more algorithms detailed connections not shown C programs Timed Automata Statecharts AIGER Petri Net CFA XCFA STS XSTS XTA CEGAR Adapters transition functions, refiners, etc. Cex / Witness Back- transformation PLC SV-COMP 2024 ✓ / ? / X
3. EmergenTheta Separate tool for the “emerging” techniques (separate evaluation) Prerequisite: Remove dependency on abstraction-specific classes detailed connections not shown C programs Timed Automata Statecharts AIGER Petri Net PLC SV-COMP 2024 Not dependent on Precision New Transition function Not dependent on ARG k-induction IMC BMC CFA XCFA STS XSTS XTA CEGAR Adapters transition functions, refiners, etc. Cex / Witness ✓ / ? / X Back- transformation
4. EmergenTheta on SV-COMP IMC Max. 90s C program (ReachSafety) BMC + k-induction • Theta (CEGAR) much better in finding bugs • Needs further investigation • More than half of the tasks solved by each tool was not solved by the other • Complementary tools SV-COMP 2024 ReachSafety Theta EmergenTheta Both True 318 399 305 False 443 21 87 All 761 420 392 ReachSafety Theta EmergenTheta Both True 318 399 305 False 443 21 87