Marek Trtík

Jan Obdržálek, Jiří Slabý, Marek Trtík

STANSE is a free (available under the GPLv2 license) modular framework for finding bugs in C programs using static analysis. Its two main design goals are 1) ability to process large software projects like the Linux kernel and 2) extensibility with new bug-finding techniques with a minimal effort. Currently there are four bug-finding algorithms implemented within STANSE: AutomatonChecker checks properties described in an automata-based formalism, ThreadChecker detects deadlocks among multiple threads, LockChecker finds locking errors based on statistics, and ReachabilityChecker looks for unreachable code. STANSE has been tested on the Linux kernel, where it has found dozens of previously undiscovered bugs.

Marek Trtík

We present a generalisation of King's symbolic execution technique called compact symbolic execution. It is based on a concept of templates: a template is a declarative parametric description of such a program part, generating paths in symbolic execution tree with regularities in program states along them. Typical sources of these paths are program loops and recursive calls. Using the templates we fold the corresponding paths into single vertices and therefore considerably reduce size of the tree without loss of any information. There are even programs for which compact symbolic execution trees are finite even though the classic symbolic execution trees are infinite.