Probabilistic Model Checking for Energy Analysis in Software Product Lines

In a software product line (SPL), a collection of software products is defined by their commonalities in terms of features rather than explicitly specifying all products one-by-one. Several verification techniques were adapted to establish temporal properties of SPLs. Symbolic and family-based model checking have been proven to be successful for tackling the combinatorial blow-up arising when reasoning about several feature combinations. However, most formal verification approaches for SPLs presented in the literature focus on the static SPLs, where the features of a product are fixed and cannot be changed during runtime. This is in contrast to dynamic SPLs, allowing to adapt feature combinations of a product dynamically after deployment. The main contribution of the paper is a compositional modeling framework for dynamic SPLs, which supports probabilistic and nondeterministic choices and allows for quantitative analysis. We specify the feature changes during runtime within an automata-based coordination component, enabling to reason over strategies how to trigger dynamic feature changes for optimizing various quantitative objectives, e.g., energy or monetary costs and reliability. For our framework there is a natural and conceptually simple translation into the input language of the prominent probabilistic model checker PRISM. This facilitates the application of PRISM's powerful symbolic engine to the operational behavior of dynamic SPLs and their family-based analysis against various quantitative queries. We demonstrate feasibility of our approach by a case study issuing an energy-aware bonding network device.Comment: 14 pages, 11 figure

Building Blocks for Control System Software

Software implementation of control laws for industrial systems seem straightforward, but is not. The computer code stemming from the control laws is mostly not more than 10 to 30% of the total. A building-block approach for embedded control system development is advocated to enable a fast and efficient software design process.\ud We have developed the CTJ library, Communicating Threads for Java¿,\ud resulting in fundamental elements for creating building blocks to implement communication using channels. Due to the simulate-ability, our building block method is suitable for a concurrent engineering design approach. Furthermore, via a stepwise refinement process, using verification by simulation, the implementation trajectory can be done efficiently

Quantitative Analysis of Probabilistic Models of Software Product Lines with Statistical Model Checking

We investigate the suitability of statistical model checking techniques for analysing quantitative properties of software product line models with probabilistic aspects. For this purpose, we enrich the feature-oriented language FLan with action rates, which specify the likelihood of exhibiting particular behaviour or of installing features at a specific moment or in a specific order. The enriched language (called PFLan) allows us to specify models of software product lines with probabilistic configurations and behaviour, e.g. by considering a PFLan semantics based on discrete-time Markov chains. The Maude implementation of PFLan is combined with the distributed statistical model checker MultiVeStA to perform quantitative analyses of a simple product line case study. The presented analyses include the likelihood of certain behaviour of interest (e.g. product malfunctioning) and the expected average cost of products.Comment: In Proceedings FMSPLE 2015, arXiv:1504.0301

Automated analysis of feature models: Quo vadis?

Feature models have been used since the 90's to describe software product lines as a way of reusing common parts in a family of software systems. In 2010, a systematic literature review was published summarizing the advances and settling the basis of the area of Automated Analysis of Feature Models (AAFM). From then on, different studies have applied the AAFM in different domains. In this paper, we provide an overview of the evolution of this field since 2010 by performing a systematic mapping study considering 423 primary sources. We found six different variability facets where the AAFM is being applied that define the tendencies: product configuration and derivation; testing and evolution; reverse engineering; multi-model variability-analysis; variability modelling and variability-intensive systems. We also confirmed that there is a lack of industrial evidence in most of the cases. Finally, we present where and when the papers have been published and who are the authors and institutions that are contributing to the field. We observed that the maturity is proven by the increment in the number of journals published along the years as well as the diversity of conferences and workshops where papers are published. We also suggest some synergies with other areas such as cloud or mobile computing among others that can motivate further research in the future.Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad TIN2015-70560-RJunta de Andalucía TIC-186

Software for Embedded Control Systems

The research of our team deals with the realization of control schemes on digital computers. As such the emphasis is on embedded control software implementation. Applications are in the field of mechatronic devices, using a mechatronic design approach (the integrated and optimal design of a mechanical system and its embedded control system). The ultimate goal is to support the application developer (i.e. mechatronic design engineer) such that implementing control software according to ðo it the first time right¿ becomes business as usual

A Dual-Engine for Early Analysis of Critical Systems

This paper presents a framework for modeling, simulating, and checking properties of critical systems based on the Alloy language -- a declarative, first-order, relational logic with a built-in transitive closure operator. The paper introduces a new dual-analysis engine that is capable of providing both counterexamples and proofs. Counterexamples are found fully automatically using an SMT solver, which provides a better support for numerical expressions than the existing Alloy Analyzer. Proofs, however, cannot always be found automatically since the Alloy language is undecidable. Our engine offers an economical approach by first trying to prove properties using a fully-automatic, SMT-based analysis, and switches to an interactive theorem prover only if the first attempt fails. This paper also reports on applying our framework to Microsoft's COM standard and the mark-and-sweep garbage collection algorithm.Comment: Workshop on Dependable Software for Critical Infrastructures (DSCI), Berlin 201