Theory decision by decomposition

  • Authors:
  • Maria Paola Bonacina;Mnacho Echenim

  • Affiliations:
  • Dipartimento di Informatica, Università degli Studi di Verona, Strada Le Grazie 15, I-37134 Verona, Italy;Laboratoire dInformatique de Grenoble, Institut National Polytechnique de Grenoble, 46, Avenue Felix Viallet, F-38031 Grenoble, France

  • Venue:
  • Journal of Symbolic Computation
  • Year:
  • 2010

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Abstract

The topic of this article is decision procedures for satisfiability modulo theories (SMT) of arbitrary quantifier-free formulae. We propose an approach that decomposes the formula in such a way that its definitional part, including the theory, can be compiled by a rewrite-based first-order theorem prover, and the residual problem can be decided by an SMT-solver, based on the Davis-Putnam-Logemann-Loveland procedure. The resulting decision by stages mechanism may unite the complementary strengths of first-order provers and SMT-solvers. We demonstrate its practicality by giving decision procedures for the theories of records, integer offsets and arrays, with or without extensionality, and for combinations including such theories.