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A model and temporal proof system for networks of processes

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Abstract

An approach is presented for modeling networks of processes that communicate exclusively through message passing. A process (or a network) is defined by its set of possible behaviors, where each behavior is an abstraction of an infinite execution sequence of the process. The resulting model is simple and modular and facilitates information hiding. It can describe both synchronous and asynchronous networks. It supports recursively-defined networks and can characterize liveness properties such as progress of inputs and outputs, termination, and deadlock.

A sound and complete temporal proof system based on the model is presented. It is compositional — a specification of a network is formed naturally from specifications of its components.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Computer Science Department, Cornell University, 14853, Ithaca, NY, USA

    Van Nguyen, Alan Demers & David Gries

  2. Computer Systems Laboratory, Stanford University, 94305, Stanford, CA, USA

    Susan Owicki

Authors
  1. Van Nguyen
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  2. Alan Demers
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  3. David Gries
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  4. Susan Owicki
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Additional information

Van Nguyen received a B.S. degree from Monash University in 1982, an M.S. degree from Cornell University in 1983 and a Ph.D. degree from Cornell University in 1985. He has accepted a research position at the IBM Thomas J. Watson Research Center. His research interests include logics and semantics of programs, programming languages, program synthesis and distributed computing.

David Gries received a Ph.D. (actually, a Dr. rer. nat.) from the Munich Institute of Technology (Germany) in 1966. He was an assistant professor at Stanford from 1966 to 1969 and has been on the faculty of Computer Science at Cornell since 1969, where he is presently chairman of the department. He is known for his research in compilers (he is a co-author of the Alcor-Illinois 7090 Algol compiler, finished in 1964), for his research in programming methodology, and for his texts “Compiler Construction for Digital Computers” (1971) and “Science of Programming” (1981). He was a Guggenheim Fellow in 1984–85.

Susan Owicki received the B.S. degree in mathematics from Michigan State University in 1968. She then attended Cornell University as an NSF Fellow, receiving the M.S. and Ph.D. degrees in computer science in 1970 and 1975, respectively. From 1975 to 1976 she was an Assistant Professor in the Department of Computer Science at Cornell University. Since then she has been a member of the Department of Electrical Engineering at Stanford University, where she is currently an Associate Professor.

Dr. Owicki's research in the area of concurrent programming has included work in program verification, programming languages and methodology, and design of algorithms for concurrent systems. She has been particularly interested in problems in computer networks and distributed systems.

This work was supported by the NSF under grants MCS-81-03605, DCR-83-202-74, and DCR-83-123-19; by NASA under contract NAGW419; and by the third author's Guggenheim Fellowship

This paper is based on part of the first author's Ph.D. thesis

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Nguyen, V., Demers, A., Gries, D. et al. A model and temporal proof system for networks of processes. Distrib Comput 1, 7–25 (1986). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF01843567

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