Dynamically discovering likely interface invariants

  • Authors:

  • Christoph Csallner;Yannis Smaragdakis

  • Affiliations:

  • Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA;Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, GA

  • Venue:
  • Proceedings of the 28th international conference on Software engineering
  • Year:
  • 2006

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Abstract

Dynamic invariant detection is an approach that has received considerable attention in the recent research literature. A natural question arises in languages that separate the interface of a code module from its implementation: does an inferred invariant describe the interface or the implementation? Furthermore, if an implementation is allowed to refine another, as, for instance, in object-oriented method overriding, what is the relation between the inferred invariants of the overriding and the overridden method? The problem is of great practical interest. Invariants derived by real tools, like Daikon, often suffer from internal inconsistencies when overriding is taken into account, becoming unsuitable for some automated uses. We discuss the interactions between overriding and inferred invariants, and describe the implementation of an invariant inference tool that produces consistent invariants for interfaces and overridden methods.