ParAlloy: Towards a Framework for Efficient Parallel Analysis of Alloy Models

Alloy [Jac02a] is a widely adopted relational modeling language. Its appealing syntax and the support provided by the Alloy Analyzer [Jac02b] tool make model analysis accessible to a public of non-specialists. A model and property are translated to a propositional formula, which is fed to a SAT-solver to search for counterexamples. The translation strongly depends on user-provided bounds for data domains called scopes – the larger the scopes, the more confident the user is about the correctness of the model. Due to the intrinsic complexity of the SAT-solving step, it is often the case that analyses do not scale well enough to remain feasible as scopes grow. ParAlloy exploits the possibility of splitting the SAT formula, thus allowing for parallel SAT-solving of Alloy models. Three of its important characteristics are: