Formal Validation of a High Performance Error Control Protocol Using SPIN

Abstract

This paper presents the specification and validation of a high performance error control protocol. A formal specification model of the protocol was described using the PROMELA language. Formal analysis of the protocol model was validated using the SPIN validation tool. The uncovering of several subtle properties of the protocol has demonstrated the advantage of employing formal validation methods in designing distributed systems.

The model checker SPIN

“…SPIN has also been applied to the verification of data transfer protocols [5], bus protocols [6], address registration protocols [55], error control protocols [66], requirements analysis [4], controllers for reactive systems [10], distributed process scheduling algorithms [59], fault tolerant systems [1], hardware-software codesign [80], asynchronous hardware designs [62], multiprocessor designs [76], local area network controllers [30], microkernel design [19], [75], operating systems code [9], [64], railway signaling protocols and circuitry [36], [20], [15], rendezvous algorithms [44], security protocols [47], flood surge control systems [48], feature interaction problems [50], ethernet collision avoidance techniques [46], and self-stabilizing protocols [67].…”

Rational verification: game-theoretic verification of multi-agent systems

“…Perhaps the most obvious challenge in making rational verification an industrial-strength reality is that of the high computational complexity of the basic decision problems. Whilst LTL formulae are expressive and natural [79], and moreover, widely used in industry [21,26,70,71], the 2EXPTIME-completeness results leave our problems grossly intractable. As such, it is important for us to consider other languages which strike a balance of complexity and expressiveness -how can we capture the richness of multiagent systems, whilst still being able to reason about them effectively?…”