Bisimulations Meet PCTL Equivalences for Probabilistic Automata

Probabilistic automata (PAs) have been successfully applied in formal verification of concurrent and stochastic systems. Efficient model checking algorithms have been studied, where the most often used logics for expressing properties are based on probabilistic computation tree logic (PCTL) and its extension PCTL^*. Various behavioral equivalences are proposed, as a powerful tool for abstraction and compositional minimization for PAs. Unfortunately, the equivalences are well-known to be sound, but not complete with respect to the logical equivalences induced by PCTL or PCTL*. The desire of a both sound and complete behavioral equivalence has been pointed out by Segala in 1995, but remains open throughout the years. In this paper we introduce novel notions of strong bisimulation relations, which characterize PCTL and PCTL* exactly. We extend weak bisimulations that characterize PCTL and PCTL* without next operator, respectively. Further, we also extend the framework to simulation preorders. Thus, our paper bridges the gap between logical and behavioral equivalences and preorders in this setting.Comment: Long version of CONCUR'11 with the same title: added extension to simulations, countable state

A Logic for True Concurrency

We propose a logic for true concurrency whose formulae predicate about events in computations and their causal dependencies. The induced logical equivalence is hereditary history preserving bisimilarity, and fragments of the logic can be identified which correspond to other true concurrent behavioural equivalences in the literature: step, pomset and history preserving bisimilarity. Standard Hennessy-Milner logic, and thus (interleaving) bisimilarity, is also recovered as a fragment. We also propose an extension of the logic with fixpoint operators, thus allowing to describe causal and concurrency properties of infinite computations. We believe that this work contributes to a rational presentation of the true concurrent spectrum and to a deeper understanding of the relations between the involved behavioural equivalences.Comment: 31 pages, a preliminary version appeared in CONCUR 201

A Logic with Reverse Modalities for History-preserving Bisimulations

We introduce event identifier logic (EIL) which extends Hennessy-Milner logic by the addition of (1) reverse as well as forward modalities, and (2) identifiers to keep track of events. We show that this logic corresponds to hereditary history-preserving (HH) bisimulation equivalence within a particular true-concurrency model, namely stable configuration structures. We furthermore show how natural sublogics of EIL correspond to coarser equivalences. In particular we provide logical characterisations of weak history-preserving (WH) and history-preserving (H) bisimulation. Logics corresponding to HH and H bisimulation have been given previously, but not to WH bisimulation (when autoconcurrency is allowed), as far as we are aware. We also present characteristic formulas which characterise individual structures with respect to history-preserving equivalences.Comment: In Proceedings EXPRESS 2011, arXiv:1108.407

Conflict vs causality in event structures

Event structures are one of the best known models for concurrency. Many variants of the basic model and many possible notions of equivalence for them have been devised in the literature. In this paper, we study how the spectrum of equivalences for Labelled Prime Event Structures built by Van Glabbeek and Goltz changes if we consider two simplified notions of event structures: the first is obtained by removing the causality relation (Coherence Spaces) and the second by removing the conflict relation (Elementary Event Structures). As expected, in both cases the spectrum turns out to be simplified, since some notions of equivalence coincide in the simplified settings; actually, we prove that removing causality simplifies the spectrum considerably more than removing conflict. Furthermore, while the labeling of events and their cardinality play no role when removing causality, both the labeling function and the cardinality of the event set dramatically influence the spectrum of equivalences in the conflict-free setting

TAPAs: A Tool for the Analysis of Process Algebras

Process algebras are formalisms for modelling concurrent systems that permit mathematical reasoning with respect to a set of desired properties. TAPAs is a tool that can be used to support the use of process algebras to specify and analyze concurrent systems. It does not aim at guaranteeing high performances, but has been developed as a support to teaching. Systems are described as process algebras terms that are then mapped to labelled transition systems (LTSs). Properties are verified either by checking equivalence of concrete and abstract systems descriptions, or by model checking temporal formulae over the obtained LTS. A key feature of TAPAs, that makes it particularly suitable for teaching, is that it maintains a consistent double representation of each system both as a term and as a graph. Another useful didactical feature is the exhibition of counterexamples in case equivalences are not verified or the proposed formulae are not satisfied

Behavioral Equivalences

Beahvioral equivalences serve to establish in which cases two reactive (possible concurrent) systems offer similar interaction capabilities relatively to other systems representing their operating environment. Behavioral equivalences have been mainly developed in the context of process algebras, mathematically rigorous languages that have been used for describing and verifying properties of concurrent communicating systems. By relying on the so called structural operational semantics (SOS), labelled transition systems, are associated to each term of a process algebra. Behavioral equivalences are used to abstract from unwanted details and identify those labelled transition systems that react “similarly” to external experiments. Due to the large number of properties which may be relevant in the analysis of concurrent systems, many different theories of equivalences have been proposed in the literature. The main contenders consider those systems equivalent that (i) perform the same sequences of actions, or (ii) perform the same sequences of actions and after each sequence are ready to accept the same sets of actions, or (iii) perform the same sequences of actions and after each sequence exhibit, recursively, the same behavior. This approach leads to many different equivalences that preserve significantly different properties of systems

CCS Dynamic Bisimulation is Progressing

Weak Observational Congruence (woc) defined on CCS agents is not a bisimulation since it does not require two states reached by bisimilar computations of woc agents to be still woc, e.g.\ $\alpha.\tau.\beta.nil$ and $\alpha.\beta.nil$ are woc but $\tau.\beta.nil$ and $\beta.nil$ are not. This fact prevents us from characterizing CCS semantics (when $\tau$ is considered invisible) as a final algebra, since the semantic function would induce an equivalence over the agents that is both a congruence and a bisimulation. In the paper we introduce a new behavioural equivalence for CCS agents, which is the coarsest among those bisimulations which are also congruences. We call it Dynamic Observational Congruence because it expresses a natural notion of equivalence for concurrent systems required to simulate each other in the presence of dynamic, i.e.\ run time, (re)configurations. We provide an algebraic characterization of Dynamic Congruence in terms of a universal property of finality. Furthermore we introduce Progressing Bisimulation, which forces processes to simulate each other performing explicit steps. We provide an algebraic characterization of it in terms of finality, two characterizations via modal logic in the style of HML, and a complete axiomatization for finite agents. Finally, we prove that Dynamic Congruence and Progressing Bisimulation coincide for CCS agents. Thus the title of the paper

A uniform framework for modelling nondeterministic, probabilistic, stochastic, or mixed processes and their behavioral equivalences

Labeled transition systems are typically used as behavioral models of concurrent processes, and the labeled transitions define the a one-step state-to-state reachability relation. This model can be made generalized by modifying the transition relation to associate a state reachability distribution, rather than a single target state, with any pair of source state and transition label. The state reachability distribution becomes a function mapping each possible target state to a value that expresses the degree of one-step reachability of that state. Values are taken from a preordered set equipped with a minimum that denotes unreachability. By selecting suitable preordered sets, the resulting model, called ULTraS from Uniform Labeled Transition System, can be specialized to capture well-known models of fully nondeterministic processes (LTS), fully probabilistic processes (ADTMC), fully stochastic processes (ACTMC), and of nondeterministic and probabilistic (MDP) or nondeterministic and stochastic (CTMDP) processes. This uniform treatment of different behavioral models extends to behavioral equivalences. These can be defined on ULTraS by relying on appropriate measure functions that expresses the degree of reachability of a set of states when performing single-step or multi-step computations. It is shown that the specializations of bisimulation, trace, and testing equivalences for the different classes of ULTraS coincide with the behavioral equivalences defined in the literature over traditional models

The Spectrum of Strong Behavioral Equivalences for Nondeterministic and Probabilistic Processes

We present a spectrum of trace-based, testing, and bisimulation equivalences for nondeterministic and probabilistic processes whose activities are all observable. For every equivalence under study, we examine the discriminating power of three variants stemming from three approaches that differ for the way probabilities of events are compared when nondeterministic choices are resolved via deterministic schedulers. We show that the first approach - which compares two resolutions relatively to the probability distributions of all considered events - results in a fragment of the spectrum compatible with the spectrum of behavioral equivalences for fully probabilistic processes. In contrast, the second approach - which compares the probabilities of the events of a resolution with the probabilities of the same events in possibly different resolutions - gives rise to another fragment composed of coarser equivalences that exhibits several analogies with the spectrum of behavioral equivalences for fully nondeterministic processes. Finally, the third approach - which only compares the extremal probabilities of each event stemming from the different resolutions - yields even coarser equivalences that, however, give rise to a hierarchy similar to that stemming from the second approach.Comment: In Proceedings QAPL 2013, arXiv:1306.241