Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Extracting High-Level System Specifications from Source Code via Abstract State Machines

  • Conference paper
  • First Online:
Model and Data Engineering (MEDI 2019)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNPSE,volume 11815))

Included in the following conference series:

  • 735 Accesses

Abstract

We are interested in specifications which provide a consistent high-level view of systems. They should abstract irrelevant details and provide a precise and complete description of the behaviour of the system. This view of software specification can naturally be expressed by means of Gurevich’s Abstract State Machines (ASMs). There are many known benefits of such an approach to system specifications for software engineering and testing. In practice however, such specifications are rarely generated and/or maintained during software development. Addressing this problem, we present an exploratory study on (semi) automated extraction of high-level software specifications by means of ASMs. We describe, in the form of examples, an abstraction process which starts by extracting an initial ground-level ASM specification from Java source code (with the same core functionality), and ends in a high-level ASM specification at the desired level of abstraction. We argue that this process can be done in a (semi) automated way, resulting in a valuable tool to improve the current software engineering practices.

The research reported in this paper results from the project Higher-Order Logics and Structures supported by the Austrian Science Fund (FWF: [I2420-N31]). It was further supported by the Austrian Ministry for Transport, Innovation and Technology, the Federal Ministry of Science, Research and Economy, and the Province of Upper Austria in the frame of the COMET center SCCH.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Notes

  1. 1.

    http://codeanalytics.scch.at/.

  2. 2.

    https://www.omg.org/spec/ASTM/1.0/.

  3. 3.

    https://www.scch.at/de/eknows.

  4. 4.

    https://www.scch.at/de/eknows.

References

  1. Barnett, M., Börger, E., Gurevich, Y., Schulte, W., Veanes, M.: Using abstract state machines at microsoft: a case study. In: Gurevich, Y., Kutter, P.W., Odersky, M., Thiele, L. (eds.) ASM 2000. LNCS, vol. 1912, pp. 367–379. Springer, Heidelberg (2000). https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-44518-8_21

    Chapter  MATH  Google Scholar 

  2. Blass, A., Gurevich, Y.: Abstract state machines capture parallel algorithms. ACM Trans. Comput. Logic 4(4), 578–651 (2003)

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  3. Blass, A., Gurevich, Y.: Abstract state machines capture parallel algorithms: correction and extension. ACM Trans. Comput. Logic 9(3), 19:1–19:32 (2008)

    Google Scholar 

  4. Börger, E.: The origins and the development of the ASM method for high level system design and analysis. J. UCS 8(1), 2–74 (2002)

    Google Scholar 

  5. Börger, E.: Abstract state machines: a unifying view of models of computation and of system design frameworks. Ann. Pure Appl. Logic 133(1–3), 149–171 (2005)

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  6. Börger, E.: Design pattern abstractions and abstract state machines. In: Proceedings of the 12th International Workshop on Abstract State Machines, ASM 2005, 8–11 March 2005, Paris, France, pp. 91–100 (2005). http://www.univ-paris12.fr/lacl/dima/asm05/DesignPattern.ps

  7. Börger, E., Cisternino, A., Gervasi, V.: Ambient abstract state machines with applications. J. Comput. Syst. Sci. 78(3), 939–959 (2012)

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  8. Börger, E., Schewe, K.: Concurrent abstract state machines. Acta Inf. 53(5), 469–492 (2016)

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  9. Börger, E., Stärk, R.F.: Abstract State Machines. A Method for High-Level System Design and Analysis. Springer, Heidelberg (2003). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-18216-7

  10. Börger, E., Stärk, R.F.: Exploiting abstraction for specification reuse. the Java/C# case study. In: de Boer, F.S., Bonsangue, M.M., Graf, S., de Roever, W.-P. (eds.) FMCO 2003. LNCS, vol. 3188, pp. 42–76. Springer, Heidelberg (2004). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-30101-1_3

    Chapter  MATH  Google Scholar 

  11. Bowen, J.P., Breuer, P.T., Lano, K.: Formal specifications in software maintenance: from code to z\({}^{\text{++ }}\) and back again. Inf. Softw. Technol. 35(11–12), 679–690 (1993)

    Google Scholar 

  12. Chikofsky, E.J., II, J.H.C.: Reverse engineering and design recovery: a taxonomy. IEEE Softw. 7(1), 13–17 (1990)

    Google Scholar 

  13. Ferrarotti, F., Schewe, K.-D., Tec, L.: A behavioural theory for reflective sequential algorithms. In: Petrenko, A.K., Voronkov, A. (eds.) PSI 2017. LNCS, vol. 10742, pp. 117–131. Springer, Cham (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-74313-4_10

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  14. Ferrarotti, F., Schewe, K., Tec, L., Wang, Q.: A new thesis concerning synchronised parallel computing - simplified parallel ASM thesis. Theor. Comput. Sci. 649, 25–53 (2016)

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  15. Fleck, G., et al.: Experience report on building ASTM based tools for multi-language reverse engineering. In: IEEE 23rd International Conference on Software Analysis, Evolution, and Reengineering, SANER 2016, Suita, Osaka, Japan, 14–18 March 2016, vol. 1, pp. 683–687 (2016)

    Google Scholar 

  16. Grädel, E., Nowack, A.: Quantum computing and abstract state machines. In: Börger, E., Gargantini, A., Riccobene, E. (eds.) ASM 2003. LNCS, vol. 2589, pp. 309–323. Springer, Heidelberg (2003). https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-36498-6_18

    Chapter  MATH  Google Scholar 

  17. Grieskamp, W., Gurevich, Y., Schulte, W., Veanes, M.: Generating finite state machines from abstract state machines. In: Proceedings of the International Symposium on Software Testing and Analysis, ISSTA 2002, Roma, Italy, 22–24 July 2002, pp. 112–122. ACM (2002)

    Google Scholar 

  18. Gurevich, Y.: Reconsidering turing’s thesis: toward more realistic semantics of programs. Technical Report CRL-TR-36-84, January 1984

    Google Scholar 

  19. Gurevich, Y.: A new thesis. Technical Report 85T–68-203, abstracts, American Mathematical Society (1985)

    Google Scholar 

  20. Gurevich, Y.: Sequential abstract-state machines capture sequential algorithms. ACM Trans. Comput. Logic 1(1), 77–111 (2000)

    Article  MathSciNet  Google Scholar 

  21. Habrias, H., Frappier, M.: Software Specification Methods. ISTE (2006)

    Google Scholar 

  22. Izquierdo, J.L.C., Molina, J.G.: Extracting models from source code in software modernization. Softw. Syst. Model. 13(2), 713–734 (2014)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  23. Lano, K., Breuer, P.T., Haughton, H.P.: Reverse-engineering COBOL via formal methods. J. Softw. Maintenance 5(1), 13–35 (1993)

    Article  Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Software Competence Center Hagenberg, Hagenberg, Austria

    Flavio Ferrarotti, Josef Pichler, Michael Moser & Georg Buchgeher

Authors
  1. Flavio Ferrarotti
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Josef Pichler
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Michael Moser
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Georg Buchgeher
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Flavio Ferrarotti .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. UIUC Institute, Zhejiang University, Zhejiang, China

    Klaus-Dieter Schewe

  2. INPT-ENSEEIHT/IRIT, Toulouse, France

    Neeraj Kumar Singh

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2019 Springer Nature Switzerland AG

About this paper

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this paper

Ferrarotti, F., Pichler, J., Moser, M., Buchgeher, G. (2019). Extracting High-Level System Specifications from Source Code via Abstract State Machines. In: Schewe, KD., Singh, N. (eds) Model and Data Engineering. MEDI 2019. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 11815. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-32065-2_19

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-32065-2_19

  • Published:

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-030-32064-5

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-030-32065-2

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation