Jules Desharnais

Rudolf Berghammer, Jules Desharnais, Michael Winter

Given a finite and non-empty set $X$ and randomly selected specific functions and relations on $X$, we investigate the existence and non-existence of fixed points and reflexive points, respectively. First, we consider the class of functions, weaken it to the classes of partial functions, total relations and general relations and also strengthen it to the class of permutations. Then we investigate the class of involutions and the subclass of proper involutions. Finally, we treat idempotent functions, partial idempotent functions and related concepts. We count relations, calculate corresponding probabilities and also calculate the limiting values of the latter in case that the cardinality of $X$ tends to infinity. All these results have been motivated and also supported by numerous experiments performed with the RelView tool.

Nafi Diallo, Wided Ghardallou, Jules Desharnais et al.

Relative correctness is the property of a program to be more-correct than another program with respect to a given specification. Among the many properties of relative correctness, that which we found most intriguing is the property that program P' refines program P if and only if P' is more-correct than P with respect to any specification. This inspires us to reconsider program derivation by successive refinements: each step of this process mandates that we transform a program P into a program P' that refines P, i.e. P' is more-correct than P with respect to any specification. This raises the question: why should we want to make P' more-correct than P with respect to any specification, when we only have to satisfy specification R? In this paper, we discuss a process of program derivation that replaces traditional sequence of refinement-based correctness-preserving transformations starting from specification R by a sequence of relative correctness-based correctness-enhancing transformations starting from abort.