A CLP Approach to Modelling Systems

Abstract

We present a formal method for modelling the operational behavior of various kinds of systems of concurrent processes. A first objective is that the method be broadly applicable. A system can be described in terms of its processes written in a traditional syntax-based manner, or in some non-traditional form such as a timed automaton. The number of processes may be fixed, or parameterized, or, because of dynamic process creation, unbounded. The communication and synchronization between processes may be synchronous or not, and via shared variables or some form of channels. We may have a traditional interleaving of processes, or use a specific scheduling strategy. The observables modelled should not be restricted to just the values of the program variables, but possibly other attributes of the system such as its registers and cache, its clock and battery values, etc. An example application area which touches upon these characteristics is that of determining worst-case execution time.