Summary
A proof rule for the procedure call is proposed that has the property that the precondition it defines is the weakest precondition that can be inferred solely from the procedure's specification. Thus the rule enforces exactly the abstraction introduced by the specification. Gries's proof rule for the procedure call is shown not to have this property in cases when the specification involves so-called specification variables.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Bijlsma, A., Wiltink, J.G., Matthews, P.A.: Equivalence of the Gries and Martin Proof Rules for Procedure Calls. Acta Inf. 23, 357–360 (1986)
Dijkstra, E.W.: A Discipline of Programming. Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey: Prentice Hall 1976
Gries, D.: The Science of Programming. New York: Springer 1981
Gries, D., Levin, G.: Assignment and Procedure Call Proof Rules. ACM Trans. Progr. Lang. Syst. 2, 564–579 (1980)
Hemerik, C.: Formal Definitions of Programming Languages as a Basis for Compiler Construction. Thesis, Eindhoven 1984
Martin, A.J.: A General Proof Rule for Procedures in Predicate Transformer Semantics. Acta Inf. 20, 301–313 (1983)
Olderog, E.-R.: On the Notion of Expressiveness and the Rule of Adaptation. Theor. Comput. Sci. 24, 337–347 (1983)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Bijlsma, A., Matthews, P.A. & Wiltink, J.G. A sharp proof rule for procedures in wp semantics. Acta Informatica 26, 409–419 (1989). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00289144
Received:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF00289144