Abstract Error Projection

Akash Lal, Nicholas Kidd, Thomas Reps, and Tayssir Touili

To improve the reporting of results from model checking and program-analysis systems, we introduce the notion of an error projection and annotated error projection. An error projection is a set of program nodes N such that for each node n in N there exists an (abstract) error path from the program entry s through n to a specified target node t. An annotated error projection associates with each node n in the error projection an (abstract) counterexample that validates the error along with an abstract store, whose presence at n induces the error. We present novel algorithms for computing (annotated) error projections and discuss additional applications for these algorithms. Our experiments show that error projections can be computed efficiently.

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