On the use of observation equivalence in synthesis abstraction

In a previous paper we introduced the notion of synthesis abstraction, which allows efficient compositional synthesis of maximally permissive supervisors for large-scale systems of composed finite-state automata. In the current paper, observation equivalence is studied in relation to synthesis abstraction. It is shown that general observation equivalence is not useful for synthesis abstraction. Instead, we introduce additional conditions strengthening observation equivalence, so that it can be used with the compositional synthesis method. The paper concludes with an example showing the suitability of these relations to achieve substantial state reduction while computing a modular supervisor

Three variations of observation equivalence preserving synthesis abstraction

In a previous paper we introduced the notion of synthesis abstraction, which allows efficient compositional synthesis of maximally permissive supervisors for large-scale systems of composed finite-state automata. In the current paper, observation equivalence is studied in relation to synthesis abstraction. It is shown that general observation equivalence is not useful for synthesis abstraction. Instead, we introduce additional conditions strengthening observation equivalence, so that it can be used with the compositional synthesis method. The paper concludes with an example showing the suitability of these relations to achieve substantial state reduction while computing a modular supervisor

Synthesis equivalence of triples

This working paper describes a framework for compositional supervisor synthesis, which is applicable to all discrete event systems modelled as a set of deterministic automata. Compositional synthesis exploits the modular structure of the input model, and therefore works best for models consisting of a large number of small automata. State-space explosion is mitigated by the use of abstraction to simplify individual components, and the property of synthesis equivalence guarantees that the final synthesis result is the same as it would have been for the non-abstracted model. The working paper describes synthesis equivalent abstractions and shows their use in an algorithm to compute supervisors efficiently. The algorithm has been implemented in the DES software tool Supremica and successfully computes modular supervisors, even for systems with more than 1014 reachable states, in less than 30 seconds

An algorithm for compositional nonblocking verification of extended finite-state machines

This paper describes an approach for compositional nonblocking verification of discrete event systems modelled as extended finite-state machines (EFSM). Previous results about finite-state machines in lock-step synchronisation are generalised and applied to EFSMs communicating via shared variables. This gives rise to an EFSM-based conflict check algorithm that composes EFSMs gradually and partially unfolds variables as needed. At each step, components are simplified using conflict-equivalence preserving abstraction. The algorithm has been implemented in the discrete event systems tool Supremica. The paper presents experimental results for the verification of two scalable manufacturing system models, and shows that the EFSM-based algorithm verifies some large models faster than previously used methods

Compositional nonblocking verification with always enabled events and selfloop-only events

This paper proposes to improve compositional nonblocking verification through the use of always enabled and selfloop-only events. Compositional verification involves abstraction to simplify parts of a system during verification. Normally, this abstraction is based on the set of events not used in the remainder of the system, i.e., in the part of the system not being simplified. Here, it is proposed to exploit more knowledge about the system and abstract events even though they are used in the remainder of the system. Abstraction rules from previous work are generalised, and experimental results demonstrate the applicability of the resulting algorithm to verify several industrial-scale discrete event system models, while achieving better state-space reduction than before

Supervising Offline Partial Evaluation of Logic Programs using Online Techniques

A major impediment for more widespread use of offline partial evaluation is the difficulty of obtaining and maintaining annotations for larger, realistic programs. Existing automatic binding-time analyses still only have limited applicability and annotations often have to be created or improved and maintained by hand, leading to errors. We present a technique to help overcome this problem by using online control techniques which supervise the specialisation process in order to help the development and maintenance of correct annotations by identifying errors. We discuss an implementation in the Logen system and show on a series of examples that this approach is effective: very few false alarms were raised while infinite loops were detected quickly. We also present the integration of this technique into a web interface, which highlights problematic annotations directly in the source code. A method to automatically fix incorrect annotations is presented, allowing the approach to be also used as a pragmatic binding time analysis. Finally we show how our method can be used for efficiently locating built-in errors in Prolog source code