SATbased Bounded and Unbounded Model Checking

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SAT-based Bounded and Unbounded Model Checking
Edmund M. Clarke Carnegie Mellon University
Joint research with C. Bartzis, A. Biere, P.
Chauhan, A. Cimatti, T. Heyman, D. Kroening, J.
Ouaknine, R. Raimi, O. Strichman, and Y. Zhu
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Why am I giving this talk?
I have an ulterior motive for this talk.
Second Edition!
Need a chapter on SAT for the second edition.
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Outline of Talk

• 1. Motivation
• 2. Bounded Model Checking
• 3. Complete methods using SAT
• a. Induction
• b. Unbounded Model Checking
• --- with cube enlargement
• --- with circuit co-factoring
• --- with interpolants

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Outline of Talk

• 1. Motivation yes
• 2. Bounded Model Checking yes
• 3. Complete methods using SAT
• a. Induction no
• b. Unbounded Model Checking
• --- with cube enlargement yes
• --- with circuit co-factoring maybe
• --- with interpolants no

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SAT Solver Progress 1960 -2010
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Model Checking (CE81,QS82)

• Specification temporal logic
• Model finite state transition graph
• Advantages
• Always terminates
• Automatic
• Usually fast
• Can handle partially specified models
• Counterexample if specification is false

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Symbolic Model Checking

• Method used by most industrial strength model
  checkers.
• Uses Boolean encoding for state machine and sets
  of states.
• Can handle much larger designs hundreds of
  state variables.
• BDDs traditionally used to represent Boolean
  functions.

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Problems with BDDs

• BDDs are a canonical representation. Often become
  too large.
• Variable ordering must be uniform along paths.
• Selecting right variable ordering very important
  for obtaining small BDDs.
• Often time consuming or needs manual
  intervention.
• Sometimes, no space efficient variable ordering
  exists.
• This talk describes alternative approaches
• to model checking that use SAT procedures.

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Advantages of SAT Procedures

• SAT procedures also operate on Boolean formulas
  but do not use canonical forms.
• Do not suffer from the potential space explosion
  of BDDs.
• Different split orderings possible on different
  branches.
• Very efficient implementations exist.

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Bounded Model Checking

• A. Biere, A. Cimatti, E. Clarke, Y. Zhu, Symbolic
  Model Checking without BDDs, TACAS99

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Bounded Model Checking as SAT
Given a property p (e.g. signal_a
signal_b) Is there a state reachable in k
cycles, which satisfies ?p ?
p
p
?p
p
p
. . .
s0
s1
s2
sk-1
sk
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The reachable states in k steps are captured by
Bounded Model Checking Safety
The property p fails in one of the k steps
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Bounded Model Checking Safety
The safety property p is valid up to step k iff
W(k) is unsatisfiable
p
p
?p
p
p
. . .
s0
s1
s2
sk-1
sk
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Example a two bit counter
Bounded Model Checking Safety
Initial state I l r
Transition R l (l ? r) r r
Property G (?l ? ?r).
For k 2, W(k) is unsatisfiable. For k 3 W(k)
is satisfiable
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Bounded Model Checking Liveness
There is no counterexample of length k to
the Liveness property Fp iff W(k) is
unsatisfiable

?p
p
p
p
p
. . .
s0
s1
s2
sk-1
sk
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BMC formula for arbitrary LTL(Standard
translation)
Size of resulting formula O(kM k3?) With
sharing of subformulas becomes O(kM k2?)
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A fixpoint based translation
T. Latvala, A. Biere, K. Heljanko, and T.
Junttila Simple Bounded LTL Model Checking
FMCAD 04

• Idea for lasso-shaped Kripke structures, the
  semantics of LTL and CTL coincide.
• Add a formula that isolates a lasso-shaped path.
• Use the fixpoint characterization of CTL, e.g.
• E? U ? ? ? (? EX E? U
  ? )

i
k
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Overall formula
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Loop constraints

• If li is true then there exists a loop at
  position i.
• At most one li is true.

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Fixpoint formula
k
i
j
False True
Size of resulting formula O(k(M ?))
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Generating the BMC formula(Based on the
Vardi-Wolper algorithm)

• A labeled Büchi automaton is a 5-tuple
• BhS, S0 , ?, L, F i
• Acceptance condition
• An infinite word w is accepted iff the
  execution of w on B passes through a final state
  an infinite number of times.

states
initial states
transition relation
final states
labels
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LTL model checking

• Given
• Transition system M
• LTL property ?
• Translate ?? into a Buchi automaton B??
• Compute product automaton P M B ??
• Check if P is empty
• Is a fair loop reachable?

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Generating the BMC formula
E. Clarke, D. Kroening, J. Ouaknine, and O.
Strichman Computational chalenges in Bounded
Model Checking STTT 05

• Encode all paths of P that start at an initial
  state and are k steps long.
• Require that
• at least one path contains a loop.
• at least one state in the loop is final.

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Generating the BMC formula
Start from the initial state
Require that some state in the loop is final
Choose a state where the loop starts
Follow k transitions
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Bounded Model Checking
k 0
k
UnSAT
no
CT is the completeness threshold
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The Completeness Threshold

• Computing CT is as hard as model checking.
• Idea Compute an over-approximation to the actual
  CT
• Consider system P as a graph.
• Compute CT from structure of P.

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Basic notions

• Diameter D(M) longest shortest path between any
  two reachable states.
• Recurrence Diameter RD(M) longest loop-free
  path between any two reachable states.
• The initialized versions DI(M) and RDI(M)
  start from an initial state.

D(M) 2
RD(M) 3
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CT for safety properties

• Theorem for AGp properties CT DI(M)

For AFp properties this does not hold
DI(M)3 but CT4
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CT for liveness properties

• Theorem for AFp properties CT RDI(M)1

• Theorem for an LTL property ? CT ?

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CT for arbitrary LTL properties
Shortest counterexample

• Theorem CKOS 05
• A Completeness Threshold for any LTL property
  ? is min(rd I(P )1, d I(P )d (P ))

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Why take the minimum?
Example 1
dI(P)d(P) 6 rdI(P)1 4
gt
Example 2
dI(P)d(P) 2 rdI(P)1 4
lt
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Formulation of diameter in QBF
Infeasible to compute the diameter using a
poly-time algorithm for shortest paths.
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SAT-based Diameter Computation

• M. Mneineh, K. Sakallah,SAT-based Sequential
  Depth Computation,ASPDAC03
• Check if there is a state s reachable in c steps
  but not reachable in less than c steps.
• Increment c, until no state is reachable in c
  steps.
• May enumerate many states in 1.

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Recurrence diameter as SAT
O(n2)
O(nlogn)
O(n)
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Complexity of BMC Formula size

• Original translation
• O(kM k2?)
• Automata based translation
• O(kM2? )
• Fixpoint based translation
• O(k(M ?))

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Complexity of BMC

• Size of SAT instance is O(k(M ?))
• k can become as large as the diameter of the
  system, which is exponential in the number of
  state variables in the worst case.
• SAT is exponential time.
• Therefore, SAT based BMC has doubly exponential
  complexity.
• But LTL model checking is singly exponential!

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Why use SAT based BMC?

• Infeasible to represent P explicitly.
• Identify shallow errors efficiently.
• In many cases rd(P) and d(P) are not exponential
  and can be rather small.
• E.g. hardware components without counters
• Modern SAT solvers are very successful in
  practice.

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Unbounded Model Checkingusing Cube Enlargement

• P. Chauhan, E. Clarke, and D. Kroening Using
  SAT based
• Image Computation for Reachability Analysis
  CMU-CS-03-151

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Reachability analysis

• Consider a system with state variables x and
  inputs i.
• S0(x) is the set of initial states.
• T(x,i,x) is the transition relation.
• We want to compute the set of reachable states
  Sreach .
• Iterative process Compute the states reachable
  in 1 step, 2 steps,

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Image computation and Reachability

• The set of immediate successors of states S (x)
  is given by
• The set of all reachable states is the least
  fixpoint

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Computing Reachability

• Si1 is the set of new states directly reachable
  from Si
• Then Sreach is the union of all Si

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SAT based image computation

• The transition relation T(x,i,x) is represented
  as a CNF formula (a set of clauses).
• If not already in CNF, it can be converted in
  polynomial time.
• The set of newly reachable states after each step
  Si as well as their union Sreach are represented
  in DNF (a set of cubes).
• Obviously ?Sreach is in CNF.

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SAT based image computation
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The image computation step

• Si is in DNF
• Convert to CNF by introducing new variables
• Solve the CNF formula
• Si(x) ? T(x,i, x) ? ?Sreach(x)
• Solution is a cube d
• Project d to x and rename to x
• Add d to Sreach(x) and Si1(x)
• Repeat until the formula becomes unsat

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Efficiency issues

• The number of satisfying assignments can be
  exponential in the number of variables. Therefore
  two problems
• Enumeration of full assignments is slow.
• Solution Cube enlargement
• The representation of Sreach and Si can grow too
  large.
• Solution Systematically combine cubes using an
  appropriate data structure.

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Cube enlargement

• SAT solvers like zChaff return complete
  assignments (minterms).
• Partial assignments (cubes) are better, because
  they represent multiple minterms.

For example, the cube x1 ? x4 represents 4
minterms
x1 ? x2 ? x3 ? x4 x1
? ?x2 ? x3 ? x4 x1 ?
x2 ? ?x3 ? x4 x1 ? ?x2 ?
?x3 ? x4
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Efficient cube set representation

• Cubes are stored in a hash table of tries.
• Each trie is associated to a unique subset of
  state variables.
• Whenever a new cube d is inserted, the
  corresponding trie is searched for cubes d that
  differ only in one literal.
• The merged cube (without the differing literal)
  is stored instead of d and d.

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Efficient cube set representation
Hash table
x1, x2
x1, x7 , x8
x2, x4
Hash keys

Tries
x2, x3 , x4

• New cube x2 ? ?x3 ? ?x4
• Identify appropriate hash table entry
• Look for matching cubes
• If match was found, delete cube and insert merged
  cube

x2
?x2
x3
x3
?x4
x4
x2 ? ?x4
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Related work

• Gupta et al, FMCAD 00 and ICCAD 01
• ? Mixed BDD / SAT approach
• K. McMillan, CAV 02
• ? Sets of states represented in CNF
• ? CNF clauses stored in ZDDs
• ? Conflict analysis for cube enlargement
• H. Kang and I. Park, DAC 03
• ? Offline Espresso to reduce the number of cubes
• ? No cube enlargement

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Unbounded Model Checking using Circuit
Cofactoring

• M. Ganai, A. Gupta and P. Ashar,
• Efficient SAT-based Unbounded Symbolic Model
  Checking Using Circuit Cofactoring, ICCAD 04

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SAT-based Image Computation

• The SAT-based procedure enumerates all state cube
  solutions.
• Each invocation of the SAT solver generates one
  new state cube.
• A blocking clause representing the negation of
  the state cube is added at each step.
• The main problem is that the required number of
  steps can be very large.

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Main Contribution

• Use circuit cofactoring to capture a large set of
  states at each enumeration step.
• Less enumeration steps
• Use circuit graph simplification to compact the
  captured states.
• Use a Hybrid Sat Solver that works on both
  OR/INVERTER circuits and CNF.

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Definitions

• State variables X.
• Input variables U.
• Partial assignment ? XU !0,1 .
• State cube s is the projection of ? on X .
• Input cube u is the projection of ? on U .
• Minterm m is a complete assignment to U extending
  u .

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Example

• X x1, x2
• U u1, u2
• ? x1 u2
• s x1
• u u2
• m u1 u2

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Cofactors of Boolean functions

• Cofactors of f(v1,,v,) with respect to variable
  v are fv(v1,,1,), fv(v1,,0,)
• Cofactor of f with respect to cube c, is fc
• Obtained by cofactoring f with respect to each
  literal in c.
• Example

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Producing larger sets of states

• Given a formula f and a satisfying assignment
  cube s
• Isolate the input part of s and complete it by
  picking values for unassigned inputs.
• Cofactor f with respect to the satisfying input
  minterm m.
• Use the function f m obtained in 2, to represent
  the set of satisfying states.

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Example

• u1 and u2 are primary inputs.
• x1 and x2 are state variables.
• We want to compute
• 9 u1u2 f

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Example cont

• The SAT solver returns ltu11,x20gt as the first
  assignment.
• Step 1 Complete the input part of the assignment
  by choosing u21 .
• Step 2 Cofactor f with respect to the satisfying
  input minterm mu1u2. We get

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Example cont

• fm represents more states than the satisfying
  cube x2
• We needed just one enumeration step to capture
  the entire solution set

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SAT-based existential quantification
The returned value of C should correspond to 9B
f(A,B)
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C , 9B f(A,B)

• C is a union of cofactors of f with respect to B,
  therefore
• C ) 9B f(A,B)
• When the algorithm terminates
• f(A,B) C is unsat, therefore
• 8B (f(A,B) _ C) is valid
• C contains no variables in B
• 8B (f(A,B)) _ C
• 9 B f(A,B) ) C

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Hybrid SAT-solver

• Represents original circuit with 2-input
  OR/INVERTOR gates
• Represents learned constraints with CNF
• Finds partial satisfying assignments
• Dynamically removes inactive clauses

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Other applications of SAT in formal verification

• D. Kroening, F. Lerda, and E. Clarke TACAS 04
• Bounded Model Checking for Software
• G. Audemard, A. Cimatti, A. Kornilowicz, and R.
  Sebastiani, FORTE 02
• Bounded Model Checking for Timed Systems
• H. Jain, D.Kroening, N. Sharigina, E. Clarke DAC
  05
• Word level predicate abstraction and refinement
  for verifying RTL verilog

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For more information

• A survey of Recent Advances in SAT-based Formal
  Verification by Mukul R Prasad, Armin Biere and
  Aarti Gupta, STTT.