Computer-Assisted Program Reasoning Based on a Relational Semantics of Programs

We present an approach to program reasoning which inserts between a program and its verification conditions an additional layer, the denotation of the program expressed in a declarative form. The program is first translated into its denotation from which subsequently the verification conditions are generated. However, even before (and independently of) any verification attempt, one may investigate the denotation itself to get insight into the "semantic essence" of the program, in particular to see whether the denotation indeed gives reason to believe that the program has the expected behavior. Errors in the program and in the meta-information may thus be detected and fixed prior to actually performing the formal verification. More concretely, following the relational approach to program semantics, we model the effect of a program as a binary relation on program states. A formal calculus is devised to derive from a program a logic formula that describes this relation and is subject for inspection and manipulation. We have implemented this idea in a comprehensive form in the RISC ProgramExplorer, a new program reasoning environment for educational purposes which encompasses the previously developed RISC ProofNavigator as an interactive proving assistant.Comment: In Proceedings THedu'11, arXiv:1202.453

Proceedings of The Rust-Edu Workshop

The 2022 Rust-Edu Workshop was an experiment. We wanted to gather together as many thought leaders we could attract in the area of Rust education, with an emphasis on academic-facing ideas. We hoped that productive discussions and future collaborations would result. Given the quick preparation and the difficulties of an international remote event, I am very happy to report a grand success. We had more than 27 participants from timezones around the globe. We had eight talks, four refereed papers and statements from 15 participants. Everyone seemed to have a good time, and I can say that I learned a ton. These proceedings are loosely organized: they represent a mere compilation of the excellent submitted work. I hope you’ll find this material as pleasant and useful as I have. Bart Massey 30 August 202

From Theory to Systems: A Grounded Approach to Programming Language Education

I present a new approach to teaching a graduate-level programming languages course focused on using systems programming ideas and languages like WebAssembly and Rust to motivate PL theory. Drawing on students\u27 prior experience with low-level languages, the course shows how type systems and PL theory are used to avoid tricky real-world errors that students encounter in practice. I reflect on the curricular design and lessons learned from two years of teaching at Stanford, showing that integrating systems ideas can provide students a more grounded and enjoyable education in programming languages. The curriculum, course notes, and assignments are freely available: http://cs242.stanford.edu/f18

N.G. de Bruijn (1918–2012) and his road to Automath, the earliest proof checker

No abstract

A User Study for Evaluation of Formal Verification Results and their Explanation at Bosch

Context: Ensuring safety for any sophisticated system is getting more complex due to the rising number of features and functionalities. This calls for formal methods to entrust confidence in such systems. Nevertheless, using formal methods in industry is demanding because of their lack of usability and the difficulty of understanding verification results. Objective: We evaluate the acceptance of formal methods by Bosch automotive engineers, particularly whether the difficulty of understanding verification results can be reduced. Method: We perform two different exploratory studies. First, we conduct a user survey to explore challenges in identifying inconsistent specifications and using formal methods by Bosch automotive engineers. Second, we perform a one-group pretest-posttest experiment to collect impressions from Bosch engineers familiar with formal methods to evaluate whether understanding verification results is simplified by our counterexample explanation approach. Results: The results from the user survey indicate that identifying refinement inconsistencies, understanding formal notations, and interpreting verification results are challenging. Nevertheless, engineers are still interested in using formal methods in real-world development processes because it could reduce the manual effort for verification. Additionally, they also believe formal methods could make the system safer. Furthermore, the one-group pretest-posttest experiment results indicate that engineers are more comfortable understanding the counterexample explanation than the raw model checker output. Limitations: The main limitation of this study is the generalizability beyond the target group of Bosch automotive engineers.Comment: This manuscript is under review with the Empirical Software Engineering journa

Improving an Online Course for SQL Learners in LAB University of Applied Sciences: Making use of MOOC for efficient course

The main purpose of this Bachelor thesis is to improve the available SQL online course which is used in LAB University of Applied Sciences to an efficient one and to keep track of the making process, from researching to implementing. Thus, the thesis consists of two main parts which are theoretical (including knowledge and research from available sources) and empirical (noting the process of course improvement with real problems, solutions as well as explanation) part. Implementing an efficient studying course requires concrete knowledge on the course content (SQL), awareness of users’ learning method adoption (MOOC specifically) as well as how to implement the best possible course by using available utilities of the teaching/ learning method. As a result, theoretical is formed as a foundation for the mentioned knowledge. As the main target of the thesis is to generate an efficient SQL online course, empirical part is a must. In this part, the creation will be described step by step through the suggestion, implementation, and improvement along with interview and survey during the process. Assignment creation using VPL will be explained and concentrated in the course implementation. The study could be continued by improving the course by using the feedback from students after the deployment of the course

Text Inspector corpus linguistics tool on trial: Checking accuracy for students' writings assessment

Digital tools are increasingly present in education not only to enhance teaching but also to assist educators with lesson planning and students’ assessment. This undergraduate dissertation defends the use of corpus linguistics tools by language teachers to carry out their work more efficiently. In fact, the dissertation’s main objective is to test one of these applications called Text Inspector to find out if English teachers could use it to evaluate the accuracy of students' writings. To this end, corpora compiled from undergraduate dissertation abstracts of students in Engineering, Business Administration and Early Childhood Teaching at University of Valladolid (Uva) have been introduced in the software, which automatically determines the Common European Framework of Reference for languages (CEFR) level of each group. Then, some metrics have been applied to the data to scientifically validate the reliability of the tool, finding some limitations.Las herramientas digitales se incluyen cada vez más en Educación, no sólo para mejorar la enseñanza, sino también para planificar las clases y puntuar a los alumnos. Este trabajo final de grado defiende el uso de herramientas de lingüística de corpus por parte de los profesores de idiomas para trabajar de forma más eficiente. De hecho, el objetivo principal del mismo es probar una de estas aplicaciones, llamada Text Inspector, para averiguar si los profesores de inglés podrían utilizarla para evaluar los escritos de sus alumnos. Para ello, se han introducido en el software corpus compilados a partir de abstracts de trabajos finales de grado de estudiantes de Ingeniería, Administración de Empresas y Educación Infantil de la Universidad de Valladolid (Uva), determinando automáticamente para cada grupo su nivel del Marco Común Europeo de Referencia para las lenguas (MCER). A continuación, se han aplicado algunas métricas a los datos para validar científicamente la fiabilidad de la herramienta, descubriendo algunas limitaciones.Departamento de Filología InglesaGrado en Estudios Inglese

The construction of a Business English curriculum, relevant to the workplace, and making use of word processing in place of handwriting

Since the Thailand economic crisis in 1997 there has been a sense of urgency expressed in many areas of the society that businesses must modernize their practices and focus more on international trade and communication. Two important components of the changes required are better use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) and better use of the English language for business communication. In the education arena this has translated into the need to provide graduates with better skills in the use of English and computers. These two skill areas come together naturally in the study of Business English. In Thailand Rajabhat Institutes have a major responsibility for the training of business professionals and for the improvement of local communities. Therefore research is required to determine how best Thai Rajabhat may improve the provision of Business English to better service the needs of employing organizations and the local community. This study set out to conduct research to address this area of concern

Coloured Petri Nets - a Pragmatic Formal Method for Designing and Analysing Distributed Systems

The thesis consists of six individual papers, where the present paper contains the mandatory overview, while the remaining five papers are found separately from the overview. The five papers can roughly be divided into three areas of research, namely case studies, education, and extensions to the CPN method.The primary purpose of the PhD thesis is to study the pragmatics, practical aspects, and intuition of CP-nets viewed as a formal method for describing and reasoning about concurrent systems. The perspective of pragmatics is our leitmotif, but at the same time in the context of CP-nets it is a kind of hypothesis of this thesis. This overview paper summarises the research conducted as an investigation of the hypothesis in the three areas of case studies, education, and extensions.The provoking claim of pragmatics should not be underestimated. In the present overview of the thesis, the CPN method is compared with a representative selection of formal methods. The graphics and simplicity of semantics, yet generality and expressiveness of the language constructs, essentially makes CP-nets a viable and attractive alternative to other formal methods. Similar graphical formal methods, such as SDL and Statecharts, typically have significantly more complicated semantics, or are domain-specific languages.research conducted in this thesis, opens a new complex of problems. Firstly, to get wider acceptance of CP-nets in industry, it is important to identify fruitful areas for the effective introduction of the CPN method. Secondly, it would be useful to identify a few extensions to the CPN method inspired by specific domains for easier adaption in industry. Thirdly, which analysis methods do future systems make use of

Perceptions and Use of Digital Technology by Educators Who Support Students with Disabilities in Public Schools: A Mixed Methods Study

The purpose of this explanatory, sequential, mixed-method study was to examine the perceptions and use of digital technology by educators supporting the needs of students with disabilities attending K-12 classrooms and any correlation between the assistive technology (AT) knowledge, skills, and needs of K-12 educators within Pennsylvania. Technology has become ubiquitous and has emerged in schools as a means for students to interact with academic content. The provision of 1:1 devices was accelerated by the COVID-19 pandemic, which created opportunities for educators to discover innovative features that made learning more accessible to all students. Results indicated educators recognized AT as helpful for all core academic classes, helped students complete their assignments, and assisted them in making academic progress. Much of the commonly used AT identified offered features that have become streamlined over time or are alternatives to non-digital items. Themes identified in the study were associated with (1) access and engagement, (2) technology integration factors, and (3) elements of AT use. Although AT was viewed positively by all participants, its integration was reliant on the comfort level of the educator, challenges experienced, and the training and support needed to effectively implement AT with confidence. Training on how to use devices, ideas for use in special education settings, and having the ability to try devices as part of the decision-making process were identified as currently working to promote AT use, whereas additional training on how to use AT in general education settings was identified as a need for improving AT implementation