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Model Checking conducts an exhaustive exploration of all possible behaviors of a software system design and as such can be used to detect defects in designs that are typically difficult to discover with conventional testing approaches.
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HiVy is a software tool set that enables verification through model checking of designs represented as finite-state machines or statecharts. HiVy provides automated translation of (1) statecharts created by use of the MathWorks Stateflow program to (2) Promela, the input language of the Spin model checker, which can then be used to verify, or trace logical errors in, distributed software systems. HiVy can operate directly on Stateflow models, or its abstract syntax of hierarchical sequential automata (HSA) can be used independently as an intermediate format for translation to Promela. In a typical design application, HiVy parses and reformats Stateflow model file data using the programs SfParse and sf2hsa, respectively. If the parsing effort is successful, an abstract syntax tree is delivered into a file named with the extension .hsa. If the design comprises several model files, they may be merged into one .hsa file before translation into Promela. Stateflow scope is preserved, and name clashes are avoided in the merge process. The HiVy program hsa2pr translates the model from the intermediate HSA format into Promela. Additionally, HiVy provides through translation a list of all statechart model propositions that are the means for formalizing linear temporal logic (LTL) properties about the model for Spin verification.
Many current-day software design tools offer some variant of statechart notation for system specification. We, like others, have built an automatic translator from (a subset of) statecharts to a model checker, for use to validate behavioral requirements. Our translator is designed to be flexible. This allows us to quickly adjust the translator to variants of statechart semantics, including problem-specific notational conventions that designers employ. Our system demonstration will be of interest to the following two communities: (1) Potential end-users: Our demonstration will show translation from statecharts created in a commercial UML tool (Rational Rose) to Promela, the input language of Holzmann's model checker SPIN. The translation is accomplished automatically. To accommodate the major variants of statechart semantics, our tool offers user-selectable choices among semantic alternatives. Options for customized semantic variants are also made available. The net result is an easy-to-use tool that operates on a wide range of statechart diagrams to automate the pathway to model-checking input. (2) Other researchers: Our translator embodies, in one tool, ideas and approaches drawn from several sources. Solutions to the major challenges of statechart-to-model-checker translation (e.g., determining which transition(s) will fire, handling of concurrent activities) are retired in a uniform, fully mechanized, setting. The way in which the underlying architecture of the translator itself facilitates flexible and customizable translation will also be evident.