Abstract
Different views on nondeterminism and their effect on correctness proofs are investigated. These include allowing or disallowing dead ends and/or nontermination. A simple model of transition systems is used for this treatment, and a generalization of intermittent assertions is introduced which allows referencing the program path. Parallelism is considered as a special kind of nondeterminism. An additional proof rule is required for parallel programs, to express a fair scheduling policy. As an application, a total correctness proof of Dijkstra's on-the-fly garbage collection algorithm is sketched.
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© 1979 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
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Kurki-Suonio, R. (1979). Nondeterminism, parallelism and intermittent assertions. In: Blum, E.K., Paul, M., Takasu, S. (eds) Mathematical Studies of Information Processing. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 75. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-09541-1_24
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-09541-1_24
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Online ISBN: 978-3-540-35010-1
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