Validation of the Link Layer Protocol of the IEEE-1394 Serial Bus ("FireWire"): an Experiment with E-LOTOS

Mihaela Sighireanu and Radu Mateescu

Proceedings of the 2nd COST 247 International Workshop on Applied Formal Methods in System Design (Zagreb, Croatia), June 1997

Full version available as INRIA Research Report RR-3172.

Abstract:

This paper deals with the description in E-LOTOS of the asynchronous Link layer protocol of the IEEE-1394 Standard and its verification using model-checking. The E-LOTOS descriptions are based on both the standard and the mu-CRL description written by Luttik. The verifications are performed using the CADP (CAESAR/ALDEBARAN) toolbox. We translate the E-LOTOS descriptions in LOTOS using the TRAIAN tool, and then we generate the underlying LTS models using the CAESAR compiler. We formally express in the ACTL temporal logic the five correctness properties of the Link layer protocol stated by Luttik in natural language and we verify them on the LTS models using the XTL model-checker. We detect and correct a potential deadlock caused by the ambiguous semantics of the state machines given in the standard, which can be misleading for implementors of the IEEE-1394 protocol.

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