Computability and Complexity Results for a Spatial Assertion Language for Data Structures

The work

AuthorsCristiano Calcagno; Hongseok Yang; Peter W. O'Hearn
Editors
Typeincollection
Year2001
Citekeycalcagno2001computability

Where it appeared

Published inFoundations of Software Technology and Theoretical Computer Science (FSTTCS)
PublisherSpringer
Volume2245
Pages108--119

Abstract

This paper studies a recently developed an approach to rea- soning about mutable data structures, which uses an assertion language with spatial conjunction and implication connectives. We investigate computability and complexity properties of a subset of the language, which allows statements about the shape of pointer structures (such as “there is a link from x to y”) to be made, but not statements about the data held in cells (such as “x is a prime number”). We show that valid- ity, even for this restricted language, is not r.e., but that the quantifier- free sublanguage is decidable. We then consider the complexity of model checking and validity for several fragments.

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Cite it as

@incollection{calcagno2001computability,
  title        = {Computability and Complexity Results for a Spatial Assertion Language for Data Structures},
  author       = {Cristiano Calcagno and Hongseok Yang and Peter W. O'Hearn},
  year         = {2001},
  booktitle    = {Foundations of Software Technology and Theoretical Computer Science (FSTTCS)},
  publisher    = {Springer},
  volume       = {2245},
  pages        = {108--119},
  doi          = {10.1007/3-540-45294-x_10},
}

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