Bounded model-checking of discrete duration calculus

Reviewer: Vitus S.W. Lam

In the model-checking community, asserting the soundness of a finite-state model is achieved by verifying the model against appropriate mathematical specifications. The duration calculus is an interval temporal logic for defining specifications by means of linear duration invariants (LDIs) within the context of real-time systems. Motivated by the absence of an efficient method to determine whether a model represented as a timed automaton satisfies a subset of extended LDIs (ELDIs), the authors put forward an alternative approach for checking the validity of ELDIs. The paper begins with a review of timed automata and ELDIs, and the central principles of the proposed approach and running examples are presented. The implementation of the approach is formally specified in the form of algorithms. Both proof of correctness and runtime analysis of the algorithms are examined. Specifically, the appendix is devoted to a complete proof for the algorithms. The paper concludes with a discussion of a prototype that builds on UPPAAL, which is a model checker for real-time systems. This paper is densely packed with formal definitions, formulas, mathematical-style pseudocode, and proofs. To fully appreciate the rigorous approach to satisfiability and model checking, readers are assumed to be well versed in mathematics. Consequently, the target audience is principally computer scientists with a high degree of mathematical maturity. Online Computing Reviews Service