research-article

An operational and axiomatic semantics for non-determinism and sequence points in C

Author:

Robbert KrebbersAuthors Info & Claims

ACM SIGPLAN Notices, Volume 49, Issue 1

Pages 101 - 112

https://doi.org/10.1145/2578855.2535878

Published: 08 January 2014 Publication History

Abstract

The C11 standard of the C programming language does not specify the execution order of expressions. Besides, to make more effective optimizations possible (eg. delaying of side-effects and interleaving), it gives compilers in certain cases the freedom to use even more behaviors than just those of all execution orders.

Widely used C compilers actually exploit this freedom given by the C standard for optimizations, so it should be taken seriously in formal verification. This paper presents an operational and axiomatic semantics (based on separation logic) for non-determinism and sequence points in C. We prove soundness of our axiomatic semantics with respect to our operational semantics. This proof has been fully formalized using the Coq proof assistant.

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Cited By

Sammler MLepigre RKrebbers RMemarian KDreyer DGarg DFreund SYahav E(2021)RefinedC: automating the foundational verification of C code with refined ownership typesProceedings of the 42nd ACM SIGPLAN International Conference on Programming Language Design and Implementation10.1145/3453483.3454036(158-174)Online publication date: 19-Jun-2021
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3453483.3454036
Kamburjan EWasser N(2022)The Right Kind of Non-Determinism: Using Concurrency to Verify C Programs with Underspecified SemanticsElectronic Proceedings in Theoretical Computer Science10.4204/EPTCS.365.1365(1-16)Online publication date: 9-Aug-2022
https://doi.org/10.4204/EPTCS.365.1
Sammler MLepigre RKrebbers RMemarian KDreyer DGarg DFreund SYahav E(2021)RefinedC: automating the foundational verification of C code with refined ownership typesProceedings of the 42nd ACM SIGPLAN International Conference on Programming Language Design and Implementation10.1145/3453483.3454036(158-174)Online publication date: 19-Jun-2021
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3453483.3454036
Show More Cited By

Index Terms

An operational and axiomatic semantics for non-determinism and sequence points in C
1. Software and its engineering
  1. Software notations and tools
    1. Formal language definitions
2. Theory of computation

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Information

Published In

cover image ACM SIGPLAN Notices

ACM SIGPLAN Notices Volume 49, Issue 1

POPL '14

January 2014

661 pages

ISSN:0362-1340

EISSN:1558-1160

DOI:10.1145/2578855

Editor:
Mark W. Bailey
Hamilton College, Clinton, NY

Issue’s Table of Contents

POPL '14: Proceedings of the 41st ACM SIGPLAN-SIGACT Symposium on Principles of Programming Languages
January 2014
702 pages
ISBN:9781450325448
DOI:10.1145/2535838
General Chair:
Suresh Jagannathan
Purdue University, USA
,
Program Chair:
Peter Sewell
University of Cambridge, UK

Copyright © 2014 ACM.

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Association for Computing Machinery

New York, NY, United States

Publication History

Published: 08 January 2014

Published in SIGPLAN Volume 49, Issue 1

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Cited By

Sammler MLepigre RKrebbers RMemarian KDreyer DGarg DFreund SYahav E(2021)RefinedC: automating the foundational verification of C code with refined ownership typesProceedings of the 42nd ACM SIGPLAN International Conference on Programming Language Design and Implementation10.1145/3453483.3454036(158-174)Online publication date: 19-Jun-2021
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3453483.3454036
Kamburjan EWasser N(2022)The Right Kind of Non-Determinism: Using Concurrency to Verify C Programs with Underspecified SemanticsElectronic Proceedings in Theoretical Computer Science10.4204/EPTCS.365.1365(1-16)Online publication date: 9-Aug-2022
https://doi.org/10.4204/EPTCS.365.1
Sammler MLepigre RKrebbers RMemarian KDreyer DGarg DFreund SYahav E(2021)RefinedC: automating the foundational verification of C code with refined ownership typesProceedings of the 42nd ACM SIGPLAN International Conference on Programming Language Design and Implementation10.1145/3453483.3454036(158-174)Online publication date: 19-Jun-2021
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3453483.3454036
Wasser NHeydari Tabar AHähnle R(2021)Automated model extraction: From non-deterministic C code to active objectsScience of Computer Programming10.1016/j.scico.2020.102597204(102597)Online publication date: Apr-2021
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scico.2020.102597
Phulia ABhagee VBansal SDonaldson ATorlak E(2020)OOElala: order-of-evaluation based alias analysis for compiler optimizationProceedings of the 41st ACM SIGPLAN Conference on Programming Language Design and Implementation10.1145/3385412.3385962(839-853)Online publication date: 11-Jun-2020
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Memarian KGomes VDavis BKell SRichardson AWatson RSewell P(2019)Exploring C semantics and pointer provenanceProceedings of the ACM on Programming Languages10.1145/32903803:POPL(1-32)Online publication date: 2-Jan-2019
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Besson FBlazy SWilke P(2019)CompCertSJournal of Automated Reasoning10.1007/s10817-018-9496-y63:2(369-392)Online publication date: 1-Aug-2019
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/s10817-018-9496-y
Besson FBlazy SWilke P(2019)A Verified CompCert Front-End for a Memory Model Supporting Pointer Arithmetic and Uninitialised DataJournal of Automated Reasoning10.1007/s10817-017-9439-z62:4(433-480)Online publication date: 1-Apr-2019
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/s10817-017-9439-z
Frumin DGondelman LKrebbers R(2019)Semi-automated Reasoning About Non-determinism in C ExpressionsProgramming Languages and Systems10.1007/978-3-030-17184-1_3(60-87)Online publication date: 6-Apr-2019
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-17184-1_3
Besson FBlazy SDang AJensen TWilke P(2019)Compiling Sandboxes: Formally Verified Software Fault IsolationProgramming Languages and Systems10.1007/978-3-030-17184-1_18(499-524)Online publication date: 6-Apr-2019
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