Automatic Implementation of Programming Language Consistency Models

Sura, Zehra; Wong, Chi-Leung; Fang, Xing; Lee, Jaejin; Midkiff, Samuel P.; Padua, David

doi:10.1007/11596110_12

Cited by 11 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 12 publications

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“…This analysis enables one to find all potential conflicts (more or less equivalent to data races), and place fences accordingly. A fence inference scheme based on delay set analysis was successfully implemented in the "Pensieve" Java compiler [21,14,31], which can effectively process large amounts of code. However, a violation of SC does not necessarily cause a violation of any high-level properties.…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Automatic inference of memory fences

2012

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We addresses the problem of automatic verification and fence inference in concurrent programs running under relaxed memory models. Modern architectures implement relaxed memory models in which memory operations may be reordered and executed non-atomically. Instructions called memory fences are provided to the programmer, allowing control of this behavior. To ensure correctness of many algorithms, the programmer is often required to explicitly insert memory fences into her program. However, she must use as few fences as possible, or the benefits of the relaxed architecture may be lost. It is our goal to help automate the fence insertion process.We present an algorithm for automatic inference of memory fences in concurrent programs, relieving the programmer from this complex task. Given a finite-state program, a safety specification and a description of the memory model our algorithm computes a set of ordering constraints that guarantee the correctness of the program under the memory model. The computed constraints are maximally permissive: removing any constraint from the solution would permit an execution violating the specification. These constraints are then realized as additional fences in the input program.We implemented our approach in a pair of tools called fender and blender and used them to infer correct and efficient placements of fences for several non-trivial algorithms, including practical mutual exclusion primitives and concurrent data structures.

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Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Automatic inference of memory fences

2012

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“…In contrast, our focus is squarely on handling large concurrent C implementations, which in turn dictates our dynamic synthesis approach. Delay Set Analysis A number of works on fence inference [11,20,27] rely on concepts such as delay sets and conflict graphs [26]. Particularly, the Pensieve project implements fence inference based on delay set analysis.…”

Section: Related Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

Dynamic synthesis for relaxed memory models

Liu

Nedev

Prisadnikov

et al. 2012

Proceedings of the 33rd ACM SIGPLAN Conference on Programming Language Design and Implementation

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Modern architectures implement relaxed memory models which may reorder memory operations or execute them non-atomically. Special instructions called memory fences are provided, allowing control of this behavior.To implement a concurrent algorithm for a modern architecture, the programmer is forced to manually reason about subtle relaxed behaviors and figure out ways to control these behaviors by adding fences to the program. Not only is this process time consuming and error-prone, but it has to be repeated every time the implementation is ported to a different architecture.In this paper, we present the first scalable framework for handling real-world concurrent algorithms running on relaxed architectures. Given a concurrent C program, a safety specification, and a description of the memory model, our framework tests the program on the memory model to expose violations of the specification, and synthesizes a set of necessary ordering constraints that prevent these violations. The ordering constraints are then realized as additional fences in the program.We implemented our approach in a tool called DFENCE based on LLVM and used it to infer fences in a number of concurrent algorithms. Using DFENCE, we perform the first in-depth study of the interaction between fences in real-world concurrent C programs, correctness criteria such as sequential consistency and linearizability, and memory models such as TSO and PSO, yielding many interesting observations. We believe that this is the first tool that can handle programs at the scale and complexity of a lock-free memory allocator.

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“…No claim is made about the minimality of the set of inserted fences. Along related lines, [25,26] considers the Java language and aims at preserving its semantics when the program is run under a memory model that is more relaxed then the one specified in the Java model.…”

Section: Conclusion and Comparison With Other Workmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Verification-Based Approach to Memory Fence Insertion in Relaxed Memory Systems

Linden

Wolper

2011

Model Checking Software

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Abstract. This paper addresses the problem of verifying and correcting programs when they are moved from a sequential consistency execution environment to a relaxed memory context. Specifically, it considers the TSO (Total Store Order) relaxation, which corresponds to the use of store buffers, and its extension x86-TSO, which in addition allows synchronization and lock operations. The proposed approach uses a previously developed verification tool that uses finite automata to symbolically represent the possible contents of the store buffers. Its starting point is a program that is correct for the usual sequential consistency memory model, but that might be incorrect under x86-TSO. This program is then analyzed for this relaxed memory model and when errors are found (with respect to safety properties), memory fences are inserted in order to avoid these errors. The approach proceeds iteratively and heuristically, inserting memory fences until correctness is obtained, which is guaranteed to happen. An advantage of our technique is that the underlying symbolic verification tool makes a full exploration possible even for cyclic programs, which makes our approach broadly applicable. The method has been tested with an experimental implementation and can effectively handle a series of classical examples.

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Automatic Implementation of Programming Language Consistency Models

Cited by 11 publications

References 12 publications

Automatic inference of memory fences

Automatic inference of memory fences

Dynamic synthesis for relaxed memory models

A Verification-Based Approach to Memory Fence Insertion in Relaxed Memory Systems

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