process local invariant in PlusCal - tla+

process(Server \in Servers)
variable x;
{
...
}
I want to have an invariant of x > 0 for all processes. Is there any way other than making x global?
I tried
define {
Inv == \A s \in Servers: x[s] > 0
}
But in translated TLA+ code, Inv is defined before variable x

Place the invariant after the \* END TRANSLATION line and it won't get clobbered by the PlusCal translator.

Related

\in works, while \subseteq gives a "identifier undefined" error

I have the following spec:
------------------------------ MODULE Group ------------------------------
CONSTANTS People
VARIABLES members
Init == members \subseteq People
Next == members' = members
Group == Init /\ [][Next]_members
=============================================================================
(I simplified this spec to the point where it's not doing anything useful.)
When I try to run it through TLC, I get the following error:
In evaluation, the identifier members is either undefined or not an operator.
The error points to the Init line.
When I change the Init line to:
Init == members \in People
it validates fine.
I want the former functionality because I mean for members to be a collection of People, not a single person.
According to section 16.1.6 of Leslie Lamport's Specifying Systems, "TLA+ provides the following operators on sets:" and lists both \in and \subseteq.
Why is TLA+ not letting me use \subseteq?
While that is a valid TLA+ expression, TLC can only assign next-state values to a variable x by the statements x' = e or x' \in S. See section 14.2.6 for details. This holds for the initial assignment, too. In your case, you probably want members \in SUBSET People.

How do I model-check a module that depends on an unbound variable?

I'm going through Specifying Systems right now and I'm a little puzzled about how I'd model-check the following module:
---------------------------- MODULE BoundedFIFO ----------------------------
EXTENDS Naturals, Sequences
VARIABLES in, out
CONSTANT Message, N
ASSUME (N \in Nat) /\ (N > 0)
Inner(q) == INSTANCE InnerFIFO
BNext(q) == /\ Inner(q)!Next
/\ Inner(q)!BufRcv => (Len(q) < N)
Spec == \EE q : Inner(q)!Init /\ [][BNext(q)]_<<in, out, q>>
=============================================================================
I see that both the Init and BNext formulas are operators, parameterized by q. How would I supply this to the model checker?
You can't: \E x : P(x) is an unbounded expression, which TLC cannot handle. Many of the specs in Specifying Systems can't be modeled. More recent guides, such as the TLA+ Hyperbook or Learn TLA+, are more careful to keep all of their specs modelable.

Alloy pred/fun parameter constraint

The following Alloy predicate p has a parameter t declared as a singleton of type S. Invoke run p gives the correct result because the predicate body states that t may contain two different elements s and s'. However, in the second run command, a set of two disjoint elements of type S is passed into predicate p and this command gives an instance. Why is it the case?
sig S {}
pred p(t: one S) {
some s, s': t | s != s'
}
r1: run p -- no instance found
r2: run { -- instance found
some disj s0, s1: S {
S = s0 + s1
p[S]
}
}
See https://stackoverflow.com/a/43002442/1547046. Same issue, I think.
BTW, there's a nice research problem here. Can you define a coherent semantics for argument declarations that would be better (that is, simpler, unsurprising, and well defined in all contexts)?

What's wrong with this Alloy code?

I get a syntax error message for the code below.
The message designates the marked position in the addLocal assertion, stating:
"Syntax error at line 30 column 9: There are 1 possible tokens that can appear here: )"
I just can't see what's wrong here.
abstract sig Target{}
sig Addr extends Target{}
sig Name extends Target{}
sig Book
{
addr: Name->Target
}
pred add(b, b1:Book, n:Name, t:Target)
{
b1.addr = b.addr + (n->t)
}
fun lookup (b: Book, n: Name): set Addr
{
n.^(b.addr) & Addr
}
assert addLocal
{
all
b,b1:Book,
n,n1:Name,
t:Target |
add(b, b1, n, t) and n != n1 => lookup(b, n1) = lookup(b1, n1)
// |- error position
}
For reasons I never quite understood, at some point Alloy's syntax changed from using (or allowing) parentheses around the arguments to predicates and functions, to requiring square brackets. So the relevant line of addLocal needs to be re-punctuated:
add[b, b1, n, t] and n != n1 => lookup[b, n1] = lookup[b1, n1]
I don't have the grammar firmly enough in my head to be sure, but a quick glance at the grammar in appendix B of Software abstractions suggests that parentheses can wrap the arguments in the predicate declaration, but not in a predicate reference; in an expression position, parentheses always wrap a single expression, which would explain why the parser stops when it encounters the first comma in the argument list.

Use literal operators (eg "and", "or") in Groovy expressions?

My current work project allows user-provided expressions to be evaluated in specific contexts, as a way for them to extend and influence the workflow. These expressions the usual logical ones f. To make it a bit palatable for non-programmers, I'd like to give them the option of using literal operators (e.g. and, or, not instead of &, |, !).
A simple search & replace is not sufficient, as the data might contains those words within quotes and building a parser, while doable, may not be the most elegant and efficient solution.
To make the question clear: is there a way in Groovy to allow the users to write
x > 10 and y = 20 or not z
but have Groovy evaluate it as if it were:
x > 10 && y == 20 || !z
Thank you.
Recent versions of Groovy support Command chains, so it's indeed possible to write this:
compute x > 10 and y == 20 or not(z)
The word "compute" here is arbitrary, but it cannot be omitted, because it's the first "verb" in the command chain. Everything that follows alternates between verb and noun:
compute x > 10 and y == 20 or not(z)
───┬─── ──┬─── ─┬─ ───┬─── ─┬─ ──┬───
verb noun verb noun verb noun
A command chain is compiled like this:
verb(noun).verb(noun).verb(noun)...
so the example above is compiled to:
compute(x > 10).and(y == 20).or(not(z))
There are many ways to implement this. Here is just a quick & dirty proof of concept, that doesn't implement operator precedence, among other things:
class Compute {
private value
Compute(boolean v) { value = v }
def or (boolean w) { value = value || w; this }
def and(boolean w) { value = value && w; this }
String toString() { value }
}
def compute(v) { new Compute(v) }
def not(boolean v) { !v }
You can use command chains by themselves (as top-level statements) or to the right-hand side of an assignment operator (local variable or property assignment), but not inside other expressions.
If you can swap operators like > and = for the facelets-like gt and eq, respectively, i THINK your case may be doable, though it will require a lot of effort:
x gt 10 and y eq 20 or not z
resolves to:
x(gt).10(and).y(eq).20(or).not(z)
And this will be hell to parse.
The way #Brian Henry suggested is the easiest way, though not user-friendly, since it needs the parens and dots.
Well, considering we can swap the operators, you could try to intercept the Integer.call to start expressions. Having the missing properties in a script being resolved to operations can solve your new keywords problem. Then you can build expressions and save them to a list, executing them in the end of the script. It's not finished, but i came along with this:
// the operators that can be used in the script
enum Operation { eq, and, gt, not }
// every unresolved variable here will try to be resolved as an Operation
def propertyMissing(String property) { Operation.find { it.name() == property} }
// a class to contain what should be executed in the end of the script
#groovy.transform.ToString
class Instruction { def left; Operation operation; def right }
// a class to handle the next allowed tokens
class Expression {
Closure handler; Instruction instruction
def methodMissing(String method, args) {
println "method=$method, args=$args"
handler method, args
}
}
// a list to contain the instructions that will need to be parsed
def instructions = []
// the start of the whole mess: an integer will get this called
Integer.metaClass {
call = { Operation op ->
instruction = new Instruction(operation: op, left: delegate)
instructions << instruction
new Expression(
instruction: instruction,
handler:{ String method, args ->
instruction.right = method.toInteger()
println instructions
this
})
}
}
x = 12
y = 19
z = false
x gt 10 and y eq 20 or not z
Which will give an exception, due the not() part not being implemented, but it can build two Instruction objects before failing:
[Instruction(12, gt, 10), Instruction(19, eq, 20)]
Not sure if it is worth it.
The GDK tacks on and() and or() methods to Boolean. If you supplied a method like
Boolean not(Boolean b) {return !b}
you could write something like
(x > 10).and(y == 20).or(not(4 == 1))
I'm not sure that's particularly easy to write, though.

Resources