Testing semantics: connecting processes and process logics

  • Authors:

  • Dusko Pavlovic;Michael Mislove;James B. Worrell

  • Affiliations:

  • Kestrel Institute, Palo Alto, CA;Tulane University, New Orleans, LA;Oxford University, Oxford, UK

  • Venue:
  • AMAST'06 Proceedings of the 11th international conference on Algebraic Methodology and Software Technology
  • Year:
  • 2006

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Abstract

We propose a methodology based on testing as a framework to capture the interactions of a machine represented in a denotational model and the data it manipulates. Using a connection that models machines on the one hand, and the data they manipulate on the other, testing is used to capture the interactions of each with the objects on the other side: just as the data that are input into a machine can be viewed as tests that the machine can be subjected to, the machine can be viewed as a test that can be used to distinguish data. This approach is based on generalizing from duality theories that now are common in semantics to logical connections, which are simply contravariant adjunctions. In the process, it accomplishes much more than simply moving from one side of a duality to the other; it faithfully represents the interactions that embody what is happening as the computation proceeds. Our basic philosophy is that tests can be used as a basis for modeling interactions, as well as processes and the data on which they operate. In more abstract terms, tests can be viewed as formulas of process logics, and testing semantics connects processes and process logics, and assigns computational meanings to both.