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A Matching Logic Foundation for Alk

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Theoretical Aspects of Computing – ICTAC 2022 (ICTAC 2022)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNCS,volume 13572))

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Abstract

Alk is an educational platform designed to help in learning algorithms and acquiring algorithmic thinking. This paper describes how the semantics of Alk and the algorithm’s properties can be formally described using matching logic such that the reasoning about algorithms, described as Alk programs, can be done in a uniform way. Challenges are coming from the specificity of the Alk Language: abstract descriptions for the values, no declarations for variable or for parameter types, and various algorithmic paradigms (e.g., non-deterministic algorithms). The main consequence of this approach is that we may use in a sound way the symbolic execution for proving algorithms’ properties.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    In many cases, the information needed for analysis, e.g., the types of variables and the variables modified by an iterative statement, can be deduced by static analysis. Such a component is a work in progress, and it will be presented somewhere else.

  2. 2.

    For convenience, we introduce it directly in the syntax of patterns but it can be axiomatised as in [23].

  3. 3.

    In order to make the the presentation more intuitive, we use the full syntax for configurations, instead of the AST notation.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Alexandru Ioan Cuza University of Iași, Iași, Romania

    Alexandru-Ioan Lungu & Dorel Lucanu

Authors
  1. Alexandru-Ioan Lungu
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  2. Dorel Lucanu
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Correspondence to Alexandru-Ioan Lungu .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. TU München, München, Germany

    Helmut Seidl

  2. Southwest University, Chongqing, China

    Zhiming Liu

  3. NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA, USA

    Corina S. Pasareanu

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Lungu, AI., Lucanu, D. (2022). A Matching Logic Foundation for Alk. In: Seidl, H., Liu, Z., Pasareanu, C.S. (eds) Theoretical Aspects of Computing – ICTAC 2022. ICTAC 2022. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 13572. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-17715-6_19

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-17715-6_19

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  • Online ISBN: 978-3-031-17715-6

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