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MSVL: a typed language for temporal logic programming

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Abstract

The development of types is an important but challenging issue in temporal logic programming. In this paper, we investigate how to formalize and implement types in the temporal logic programming language MSVL, which is an executable subset of projection temporal logic (PTL). Specifically, we extendMSVL with a few groups of types including basic data types, pointer types and struct types. On each type, we specify the domain of values and define some standard operations in terms of logic functions and predicates. Then, it is feasible to formalize statements of type declaration of program variables and statements of struct definitions as logic formulas. As the implementation of the theory, we extend theMSV toolkit with the support of modeling, simulation and verification of typedMSVL programs. Applications to the construction of AVL tree and ordered list show the practicality of the language.

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Acknowledgements

This research was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) (Grant Nos. 61672403, 61272118, 61272117, 61402347, 61133001 and 61420106004), and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (JBG160306, and NCET-13-0947).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. ICTT and ISN Lab, Xidian University, Xi’an, 710071, China

    Xiaobing Wang, Cong Tian, Zhenhua Duan & Liang Zhao

Authors
  1. Xiaobing Wang
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  2. Cong Tian
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  3. Zhenhua Duan
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  4. Liang Zhao
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Cong Tian.

Additional information

Xiaobing Wang received the PhD degree in computer science from Xidian University, China in 2009. He is currently an associate professor in the Institute of Computing Theory and Technology (ICTT), Xidian University. He was a visiting scholar in University of Texas at Dallas, USA from 2014 to 2015. His research interests include formal methods, temporal logic programming languages, and software verification.

Cong Tian received the BS, MS, and PhD degrees in computer science from Xidian University, China in 2004, 2007, and 2009, respectively. She is currently a professor in the Institute of Computing Theory and Technology (ICTT), Xidian University. She was a visiting postdoctoral researcher in Hosei University, Japan from 2010 to 2011. Her research interests include theories in model checking, temporal logics and automata, formal verification of software systems, and software engineering. She is an awardee of the NSFC Excellent Young Scholars Program in 2013.

Zhenhua Duan received the PhD degrees in computer science from both Newcastle University and the University of Sheffield, UK. He is currently a professor in the Institute of Computing Theory and Technology (ICTT), Xidian University, China. His research interests include model checking, temporal logics, formal verification of software systems, and temporal logic programming.

Liang Zhao received the PhD degree in computer science from University of Pisa, Italy in 2012. He is currently an associate professor in the Institute of Computing Theory and Technology (ICTT), Xidian University, China. His research interests include formal verification, temporal logics and formal methods for object-oriented development.

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Wang, X., Tian, C., Duan, Z. et al. MSVL: a typed language for temporal logic programming. Front. Comput. Sci. 11, 762–785 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11704-016-6059-4

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