Matthias Volk

PROPhESY: A PRObabilistic ParamEter SYnthesis Tool

We present PROPhESY, a tool for analyzing parametric Markov chains (MCs). It can compute a rational function (i.e., a fraction of two polynomials in the model parameters) for reachability and expected reward objectives. Our tool outperforms state-of-the-art tools and supports the novel feature of conditional probabilities. PROPhESY supports incremental automatic parameter synthesis (using SMT techniques) to determine “safe” and “unsafe” regions of the parameter space. All values in these regions give rise to instantiated MCs satisfying or violating the (conditional) probability or expected reward objective. PROPhESY features a web front-end supporting visualization and user-guided parameter synthesis. Experimental results show that PROPhESY scales to MCs with millions of states and several parameters. Open image in new window

A Storm is Coming: A Modern Probabilistic Model Checker

We launch the new probabilistic model checker Storm. It features the analysis of discrete- and continuous-time variants of both Markov chains and MDPs. It supports the Prism and JANI modeling languages, probabilistic programs, dynamic fault trees and generalized stochastic Petri nets. It has a modular set-up in which solvers and symbolic engines can easily be exchanged. It offers a Python API for rapid prototyping by encapsulating Storm’s fast and scalable algorithms. Experiments on a variety of benchmarks show its competitive performance.

Accelerating Parametric Probabilistic Verification

We present a novel method for computing reachability probabilities of parametric discrete-time Markov chains whose transition probabilities are fractions of polynomials over a set of parameters.Our algorithm is based on two key ingredients: a graph decomposition into strongly connected subgraphs combined with a novel factorization strategy for polynomials. Experimental evaluations show that these approaches can lead to a speed-up of up to several orders of magnitude in comparison to existing approaches.

The COMICS tool: computing minimal counterexamples for DTMCs

This paper presents the tool COMICS 1.0, which performs model checking and generates counterexamples for DTMCs. For an input DTMC, COMICS computes an abstract system that carries the model checking information and uses this result to compute a critical subsystem, which induces a counterexample. This abstract subsystem can be refined and concretized hierarchically. The tool comes with a command line version as well as a graphical user interface that allows the user to interactively influence the refinement process of the counterexample.

Advancing Dynamic Fault Tree Analysis - Get Succinct State Spaces Fast and Synthesise Failure Rates

This paper presents a new state space generation approach for dynamic fault trees (DFTs) together with a technique to synthesise allowed failures rates in DFTs. Our state space generation technique aggressively exploits the DFT structure — detecting symmetries, spurious non-determinism, and don’t cares. Benchmarks show a gain of more than two orders of magnitude in terms of state space generation and analysis time. Our approach supports DFTs with symbolic failure rates and is complemented by parameter synthesis. This enables determining the maximal tolerable failure rate of a system component while ensuring that the mean time of failure stays below a threshold.

Model-Based Safety Analysis for Vehicle Guidance Systems

This paper considers the design-phase safety analysis of vehicle guidance systems. The proposed approach constructs dynamic fault trees (DFTs) to model a variety of safety concepts and E/E architectures for drive automation. The fault trees can be used to evaluate various quantitative measures by means of model checking. The approach is accompanied by a large-scale evaluation: The resulting DFTs with up to 300 elements constitute larger-than-before DFTs, yet the concepts and architectures can be evaluated in a matter of minutes.

Automated Fine Tuning of Probabilistic Self-Stabilizing Algorithms

Although randomized algorithms have widely been used in distributed computing as a means to tackle impossibility results, it is currently unclear what type of randomization leads to the best performance in such algorithms. This paper proposes three automated techniques to find the probability distribution that achieves minimum average recovery time for an input randomized distributed self-stabilizing protocol without changing the behavior of the algorithm. Our first technique is based on solving symbolic linear algebraic equations in order to identify fastest state reachability in parametric discrete-time Markov chains. The second approach applies parameter synthesis techniques from probabilistic model checking to compute the rational function describing the average recovery time and then uses dedicated solvers to find the optimal parameter valuation. The third approach computes over- and under-approximations of the result for a given parameter region and iteratively refines the regions with minimal recovery time up to the desired precision. The latter approach finds sub-optimal solutions with negligible errors, but it is significantly more scalable in orders of magnitude as compared to the other approaches.

Parameter Synthesis for Probabilistic Systems.

Many systems that are subject to verification give rise to probabilities; examples include randomized distributed algorithms, security, systems biology, or embedded systems. State-of-the-art probabilistic model checkers like PRISM [7] mostly work under the assumption that all model probabilities are a priori known. However, at early development stages, certain system quantities require parametric probabilistic models to be specified, where transition probabilities are given by real-valued parameters. Here, we focus on so-called parametric Markov chains (pMC), see Figure 1(a). The model checking goal is to compute rational functions, i. e., a fraction of polynomials

One Net Fits All

Dynamic Fault Trees (DFTs) are a prominent model in reliability engineering. They are strictly more expressive than static fault trees, but this comes at a price: their interpretation is non-trivial and leaves quite some freedom. This paper presents a GSPN semantics for DFTs. This semantics is rather simple and compositional. The key feature is that this GSPN semantics unifies all existing DFT semantics from the literature. All semantic variants can be obtained by choosing appropriate priorities and treatment of non-determinism.