Exploratory, Omniscient, and Multiverse Diagnostics in Debuggers for Non-Deterministic Languages
Debugging non-deterministic programs is inherently difficult as the compound effects of non-deterministic execution steps is hard to predict and gives rise to a (potentially) vast space of reachable program states such that manual exploration of all reachable states is infeasible.
Multiverse debugging addresses these problems by realising a fine-grained, exhaustive and interactive process for state space exploration. At SLE2023, Pasquier et al. presented a generic framework that makes exploration practical through user-defined reductions on program states and by proposing expressive logics for defining and searching for states and traces of interest, generalising the concept of breakpoint. The framework has been validated through the case study language AnimUML designed to make non-deterministic UML specifications executable.
In this paper, we perform additional case studies to evaluate the applicability of the framework. We analyse three non-deterministic, domain-specific languages representing three different domains: grammar engineering, formal operational semantics, and norm engineering. The framework is evaluated against requirements extracted from these domains, resulting in the identification of several limitations of the framework. We then propose a modified and extended framework and apply it to develop multiverse debuggers for the case study languages. The result demonstrates a multiverse debugging framework with more general applicability.
Fri 13 JunDisplayed time zone: Amsterdam, Berlin, Bern, Rome, Stockholm, Vienna change
11:00 - 12:30 | SLE Session 4: Debugging and Dynamic CheckingSLE 2025 at M 001 Chair(s): Eric Van Wyk University of Minnesota, Twin Cities | ||
11:00 22mTalk | Exploratory, Omniscient, and Multiverse Diagnostics in Debuggers for Non-Deterministic Languages SLE 2025 Damian Frölich University of Amsterdam, Tommaso Pacciani University of Amsterdam, L. Thomas van Binsbergen University of Amsterdam Pre-print | ||
11:22 22mTalk | Dynamic Dependency-Based Purity Checking SLE 2025 Anton Risberg Alaküla Lund University, Niklas Fors Lund University, Christoph Reichenbach Lund University Link to publication DOI | ||
11:45 45mPanel | SLE Panel: The Future of SLE SLE 2025 Thomas Degueule CNRS, Ralf Lämmel Universität Koblenz, Jeff Smits Delft University of Technology, Friedrich Steimann Fernuniversität in Hagen, Eric Van Wyk University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, Regina Hebig Universität Rostock, Rostock, Germany |