The Systematic Design of Responsibility Analysis by Abstract Interpretation

Given a behavior of interest, automatically determining the corresponding responsible entity (i.e., root cause) is task critical importance in program static analysis. In this article, novel definition responsibility based on abstraction trace semantics proposed, which takes into account cognizance observer, which, to best our knowledge, new innovative idea Compared current dependency and causality analysis methods, demonstrated be more precise various examples. However, concrete used defining uncomputable general, makes undecidable. To solve problem, article proposes sound framework abstract analysis, allows balance between cost precision. Essentially, builds partitioning automaton by an iteration over-approximating forward reachability with under/over-approximating backward impossible failure accessibility determines bounds potentially entities along paths automaton. Unlike that identifies exactly single action as every trace, may lose some precision find multiple actions each path. soundness preserved, guaranteed also found abstract.