Why Just Boogie? Translating Between Intermediate Verification Languages

The verification systems Boogie and Why3 use their respective intermediate languages to generate verification conditions from high-level programs. Since the two systems support different back-end provers (such as Z3 and Alt-Ergo) and are used to encode different high-level languages (such as C# and Java), being able to translate between their intermediate languages would provide a way to reuse one system's features to verify programs meant for the other. This paper describes a translation of Boogie into WhyML (Why3's intermediate language) that preserves semantics, verifiability, and program structure to a large degree. We implemented the translation as a tool and applied it to 194 Boogie-verified programs of various sources and sizes; Why3 verified 83% of the translated programs with the same outcome as Boogie. These results indicate that the translation is often effective and practically applicable

Formalizing Semantics with an Automatic Program Verifier

International audienceA common belief is that formalizing semantics of programming languages requires the use of a proof assistant providing (1) a specification language with advanced features such as higher-order logic, inductive definitions, type polymorphism, and (2) a corresponding proof environment where higher-order and inductive reasoning can be performed, typically with user interaction. In this paper we show that such a formalization is nowadays possible inside a mostly-automatic program verification environment. We substantiate this claim by formalizing several semantics for a simple language, and proving their equivalence, inside the Why3 environment

Formalizing Semantics with an Automatic Program Verifier

International audienceA common belief is that formalizing semantics of programming languages requires the use of a proof assistant providing (1) a specification language with advanced features such as higher-order logic, inductive definitions, type polymorphism, and (2) a corresponding proof environment where higher-order and inductive reasoning can be performed, typically with user interaction. In this paper we show that such a formalization is nowadays possible inside a mostly-automatic program verification environment. We substantiate this claim by formalizing several semantics for a simple language, and proving their equivalence, inside the Why3 environment