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arXiv · 1611.04946

Safety Model Checking with Complementary Approximations

Jianwen Li·Shufang Zhu·Yueling Zhang·Geguang Pu·Moshe Vardi
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Abstract

Formal verification techniques such as model checking, are becoming popular in hardware design. SAT-based model checking techniques such as IC3/PDR, have gained a significant success in hardware industry. In this paper, we present a new framework for SAT-based safety model checking, named Complementary Approximate Reachability (CAR). CAR is based on standard reachability analysis, but instead of maintaining a single sequence of reachable- state sets, CAR maintains two sequences of over- and under- approximate reachable-state sets, checking safety and unsafety at the same time. To construct the two sequences, CAR uses standard Boolean-reasoning algorithms, based on satisfiability solving, one to find a satisfying cube of a satisfiable Boolean formula, and one to provide a minimal unsatisfiable core of an unsatisfiable Boolean formula. We applied CAR to 548 hardware model-checking instances, and compared its performance with IC3/PDR. Our results show that CAR is able to solve 42 instances that cannot be solved by IC3/PDR. When evaluated against a portfolio that includes IC3/PDR and other approaches, CAR is able to solve 21 instances that the other approaches cannot solve. We conclude that CAR should be considered as a valuable member of any algorithmic portfolio for safety model checking.

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Jianwen Li, Shufang Zhu, Yueling Zhang, Geguang Pu, Moshe Vardi. 2016-11-15. Safety Model Checking with Complementary Approximations. https://arxiv.org/abs/1611.04946

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