Promela

PROMELA (Process or Protocol Meta Language) is a verification modeling language. The language allows for the dynamic creation of concurrent processes to model, for example, distributed systems. In PROMELA models, communication via message channels can be defined to be synchronous (i.e., rendezvous), or asynchronous (i.e., buffered). PROMELA models can be analyzed with the SPIN model checker, to verify that the modeled system produces the desired behavior.

Introduction

PROMELA is a process modeling language whose intended use is to verify the logic of parallel systems. Given a program in PROMELA, Spin can verify the model for correctness by performing random or iterative simulations of the modeled system's execution, or it can generate a C program that performs a fast exhaustive verification of the system state space. During simulations and verifications SPIN checks for the absence of deadlocks, unspecified receptions, and unexecutable code. The verifier can also be used to prove the correctness of system invariants and it can find non-progress execution cycles. Finally, it supports the verification of linear time temporal constraints; either with Promela never-claims or by directly formulating the constraints in temporal logic. Each model can be verified with Spin under different types of assumptions about the environment. Once the correctness of a model has been established with Spin, that fact can be used in the construction and verification of all subsequent models.

PROMELA programs consist of "processes," "message channels", and "variables". Processes are global objects that represent the concurrent entities of the distributed system. Message channels and variables can be declared either globally or locally within a process. Processes specify behavior, channels and global variables define the environment in which the processes run.

PROMELA Language Reference

Data Types

The basic data types used in PROMELA are presented in the table below. The sizes in bits are given for a PC i386/Linux machine.
The names bit and bool are synonyms for a single bit of information. A byte is an unsigned quantity that can store a value between 0 and 255. shorts and ints are signed quantities that differ only in the range of values they can hold.

Variables can also be declared as arrays. For example, the declaration:

int x [10] ;

declares an array of 10 integers that can be accessed in array subscript expressions like:

x [0] = x [1] + x [2] ;

The index to an array can be any expression that determines a unique integer value. The effect of an index outside the range is undefined. Multi-dimensional arrays can be defined indirectly with the help of the typedef construct (see below).

Processes

The state of a variable or of a message channel can only be changed or inspected by processes. The behavior of a process is defined by a "proctype" declaration. For example, the following declares a process type "A" with one variable state:

:proctype A()
:{
:: byte state;
:: state = 3;
:}
The "proctype" definition only declares process behavior, it does not execute it. Initially, in the PROMELA model, just one process will be executed: a process of type "init", that must be declared explicitly in every PROMELA specification.

New processes can be spawned using the "run" statement, which takes an argument consisting of the name of a "proctype", from which a process is then instantiated. The "run" operator can be used in the body of the "proctype" definitions, not only in the initial process. This allows for dynamic creation of processes in PROMELA.

An executing process disappears when it terminates--that is, when it reaches the end of the body in the "proctype" definition, and all child processes that it started have terminated.

The Atomic Construct

By prefixing a sequence of statements enclosed in curly braces with the keyword "atomic" the user can indicate that the sequence is to be executed as one indivisible unit, non-interleaved with any other processes.

:atomic:{::statements;:}

It is a runtime error if any statement, other that the first statement blocks in an atomic sequence. Atomic sequences can be an important tool in reducing the complexity of verification models. Note that atomic sequences restricts the amount of interleaving that is allowed in a distributed system. Intractable models can be made tractable by labeling all manipulations of local variables with atomic sequences.

Message Passing

Message channels are used to model the transfer of data from one process to another. They are declared either locally or globally, for instance as follows:

chan qname = [16] of {short}

This declares a channel that can store up to 16 messages of type "short".

The statement:

qname ! expr;

sends the value of the expression "expr" to the channel with name "qname", that is, it appends the value to the tail of the channel.

The statement:

qname ? msg;

receives the message, retrieves it from the head of the channel, and stores it in the variable msg. The channels pass messages in first-in-first-out order.

A rendez-vous port can be declared as a message channel with the store length zero. For example, the following:

chan port = [0] of {byte}

defines a rendez-vous port that can pass messages of type "byte". Message interactions via such rendez-vous ports are by definition synchronous.

Control Flow Constructs

There are three control flow constructs in PROMELA. They are the "case selection", the "repetition" and the "unconditional jump".

Case Selection

The simplest construct is the selection structure. Using the relative values of two variables "a" and "b", for example we can write:

if
:: (a != b) -> option1
:: (a = b) -> option2
fi

The selection structure contains two execution sequences, each preceded by a double colon. One sequence from the list will be executed. A sequence can be selected only if its first statement is executable. The first statement of a control sequence is called a "guard".

In the example above, the guards are mutually exclusive, but they need not be. If more than one guard is executable, one of the corresponding sequences is selected non-deterministically. If all guards are unexecutable the process will block until one of them can be selected.

There are two pseudo-statements that can be used as guards: the "timeout" statement and the "else" statement. The "timeout" statement models a special condition that allows a process to abort the waiting for a condition that may never become true. The else statement can be used as the initial statement of the last option sequence in a selection or iteration statement. The "else" is only executable if all other options in the same selection are not executable.

Repetition (Loop)

A logical extension of the selection structure is the repetition structure. For example:

do
:: count = count + 1
:: a = b + 2
:: (count = 0) -> break
od

describes a repetition structure in PROMELA. Only one option can be selected at a time. After the option completes, the execution of the structure is repeated. The normal way to terminate the repetition structure is with a "break" statement. It transfers the control to the instruction that immediately follows the repetition structure.

Unconditional Jumps

Another way to break a loop is the goto statement. For example, we can modify the example above as follows:

do
:: count = count + 1
:: a = b + 2
:: (count = 0) -> goto done
od

:done:::skip;
The "goto" in this example jumps to a label named done. A label can only appear before a statement. If we might want to jump at the end of the program, for example, a dummy statement "skip" is useful: it is a place holder that is always executable and has no effect.

Assertions

An important language construct in PROMELA that needs a little explanation is the "assert" statement. Statements of the form:

assert(any_boolean_condition)

are always executable. If a boolean condition specified holds, the statement has no effect. If, however, the condition does not necessarily hold, the statement will produce an error during verifications with Spin.

Complex Data Structures

A PROMELA "typedef" definition can be used to introduce a new name for a list of data objects of predefined or earlier defined types. The new type name can be used to declare and instantiate new data objects, which can be used in any context in an obvious way:

typedef MyStruct
{
short Field1;
byte Field2;
};

The access to the fields declared in a "typedef" construction is done in the same manner as in C programming language. For example:

MyStruct x;
x.Field1 = 1;

is a valid PROMELA sequence that assigns to the field "Field1" of the variable "x" the value "1".

Active Proctypes

The "active" keyword that can be prefixed to any "proctype" definition. If the keyword is present, an instance of that proctype will be active in the initial system state. Multiple instantiations of that proctype can be specified with an optional array suffix of the keyword. Example:

active proctype A() { ... }
active [4] proctype B() { ... }

Keywords

The following identifiers are reserved for use as keywords. active assert atomic bit bool break byte chan d_step Dproctype do else empty enabled fi full goto hidden if init int len mtype nempty never nfull od of pcvalue printf priority proctype provided run short skip timeout typedef unless unsigned xr xs

References

* [http://www.dai-arc.polito.it/dai-arc/manual/tools/jcat/main/node168.html The PROMELA Language]
* [http://www.cse.msu.edu/~cse470/PromelaManual/Quick.html Concise Promela Reference]
* [http://cnx.org/content/m12318/latest/ Promela and SPIN Reference]