Abstract
We examine the meaning of causality in calculi for mobile processes like the π-calculus, and we investigate the relationship between interleaving and causal semantics for such calculi. We separate two forms of causal dependencies on actions of π-calculus processes, called subject and object dependencies: The former originate from the nesting of prefixes and are propagated through interactions among processes; the latter originate from the binding mechanisms on names. We develop a notion of causal bisimulation which distinguishes processes which differ for the subject or for the object dependencies. We show that this causal equivalence can be reconducted to, or implemented into, the ordinary interleaving observation equivalence. This allows us to exploit the simpler theory of the interleaving semantics to reason about the causal one.
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Boreale, M., Sangiorgi, D. (1995). A fully abstract semantics for causality in the π-calculus. In: Mayr, E.W., Puech, C. (eds) STACS 95. STACS 1995. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 900. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-59042-0_77
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-59042-0_77
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