Current static verification techniques such as separation logic support a wide range of programs. However, such techniques only support complete and detailed specifications, which places an undue burden on users. To solve this problem, prior work proposed gradual verification, which handles complete, partial, or missing specifications by soundly combining static and dynamic checking. Gradual verification has also been extended to programs that manipulate recursive, mutable data structures on the heap. Unfortunately, this extension does not reward users with decreased dynamic checking as more specifications are written and more static guarantees are made. In fact, all properties are checked dynamically regardless of any static guarantees. Additionally, no full-fledged implementation of gradual verification exists so far, which prevents studying its performance and applicability in practice. We present Gradual C0, the first practicable gradual verifier for recursive heap data structures, which targets C0, a safe subset of C designed for education. Static verifiers supporting separation logic or implicit dynamic frames use symbolic execution for reasoning; so Gradual C0, which extends one such verifier, adopts symbolic execution at its core instead of the weakest liberal precondition approach used in prior work. Our approach addresses technical challenges related to symbolic execution with imprecise specifications, heap ownership, and branching in both program statements and specification formulas. We also deal with challenges related to minimizing insertion of dynamic checks and extensibility to other programming languages beyond C0. Finally, we provide the first empirical performance evaluation of a gradual verifier, and found that on average, Gradual C0 decreases run-time overhead between 7.1-40.2% compared to the fully-dynamic approach used in prior work (for context, the worst cases for Wise et al. [2020]’s approach range from 0.1-4.5 seconds depending on the benchmark). Further, the worst-case scenarios for performance are predictable and avoidable. This work paves the way towards evaluating gradual verification at scale.

Jenna DiVincenzo

Ian McCormack

Conrad Zimmerman

Hemant Gouni

Jacob Gorenburg

Jan-Paul Ramos-Dávila

Mona Zhang

Joshua Sunshine

Éric Tanter

Jonathan Aldrich

ACM Transactions on Programming Languages and Systems

ACM TRANSACTIONS ON PROGRAMMING LANGUAGES AND SYSTEMS (TOPLAS) 是报告编程语言领域最新研究进展的主要期刊，以及协助编程任务的系统。论文的风格可以是理论性的，也可以是实验性的，但无论哪种情况，它们都必须包含创新和新颖的内容，以推动编程语言和系统的最新发展。我们还邀请严格比较现有方法的实验论文，以及教程和调查论文。 TOPLAS 的范围包括但不限于以下主题： 用于顺序和并行编程的语言设计 编程语言实现 编程语言语义 编译器和解释器 用于程序执行存储分配和垃圾收集的运行时系统 用于编写程序规范的语言和方法 语言安全可靠的程序测试和程序验证方法及方法

The ACM Transactions on Programming Languages and Systems (TOPLAS) is a leading journal that reports on the latest research advancements in the field of programming languages and the systems that support programming tasks. The journal welcomes both theoretical and experimental papers, provided they contain innovative and novel content that advances the state of programming languages and systems. We also invite experimental papers that rigorously compare existing methods, as well as tutorial and survey papers. The scope of TOPLAS includes, but is not limited to, the following topics: language design for sequential and parallel programming, implementation of programming languages, semantics of programming languages, compilers and interpreters, runtime systems for program execution, memory allocation and garbage collection, languages and methods for writing program specifications, language safety, reliable program testing, and program verification methods.

《ACM Transactions on Programming Languages and Systems》（TOPLAS）是编程语言领域最新研究成果的重要期刊，致力于支持编程任务的系统研究。该期刊接受理论性和实验性的论文，但无论是哪种类型，论文都必须包含创新和新颖的内容，以推动编程语言和系统的发展。我们还欢迎对现有方法进行严格比较的实验论文，以及教程和调查性论文。TOPLAS的研究范围包括但不限于以下主题：顺序和并行编程的语言设计、编程语言的实现、编程语言的语义、编译器和解释器、用于程序执行的存储分配和垃圾收集的运行时系统、用于编写程序规范的语言和方法、语言安全性、可靠的程序测试和程序验证的方法。

Category	Quartile
计算机科学	2
计算机科学, 计算机软件工程	2

Gradual C0: Symbolic Execution for Gradual Verification

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Journal Info

Category	Quartile
COMPUTER SCIENCE, SOFTWARE ENGINEERING	3