3rd Workshop on
Models for Formal Analysis of Real Systems
(MARS 2018)

Logics and techniques for automated reasoning have often been developed with formal analysis and formal verification in mind. To show applicability, toy examples or tiny case studies are typically presented in research papers. Since the theory needs to be developed first, this approach is reasonable. However, to show that a developed approach actually scales to real systems, large case studies are essential.
The development of formal models of real systems usually requires a perfect understanding of informal descriptions of the system — sometimes found in RFCs or other standard documents — which are usually just written in English. Based on the type of system, an adequate specification formalism needs to be chosen, and the informal specification translated into it. Examples for such formalisms include process and program algebra, Petri nets, variations of automata, as well as timed, stochastic and probabilistic extensions of these formalisms. Abstraction from unimportant details then yields an accurate, formal model of the real system. The process of developing a detailed and accurate model usually takes a large amount of time, often months or years; without even starting a formal analysis.
When publishing the results on a formal analysis in a scientific paper, details of the model have to be skipped due to lack of space, and often the lessons learnt from modelling are not discussed since they are not the main focus of the paper.
The workshop aims at discussing exactly these unmentioned lessons.
Examples are:

• Which formalism is chosen, and why?
• Which abstractions have to be made and why?
• How are important characteristics of the system modelled?
• Were there any complications while modelling the system?
• Which measures were taken to guarantee the accuracy of the model?

The workshop emphasises modelling over verification. In particular, we invite papers that present full Models of Real Systems, which may lay the basis for future formal analysis. The models related to the submission, if in machine readable form, will be archived in a repository.
The workshop will bring together researchers from different communities that all aim at verifying real systems and are developing formal models for such systems. Areas where large models often occur are within networks, (trustworthy) systems and software verification (from byte code up to programming- and specification languages). An aim of the workshop is to present different modelling approaches, to discuss pros and cons for each of them, and to start a collection of interesting benchmarks for diverse formal methods.

8:00-8:45	Registration
8:45-9:00	Welcome
9:00-10:00	Invited Presentation Formal Verification of Code Generators for Modeling Languages Slides      Xavier Leroy
10:00-10:30	Coffee Break
10:30-12:00	Cryptographic protocols A Formal TLS Handshake Model in LNT Slides      Josip Bozic, Lina Marsso, Radu Mateescu and Franz Wotawa An Experiment in Ping-Pong Protocol Verification by Nondeterministic Pushdown Automata (slides available from author)      Robert Glück Comparative Study of Eight Formal Specifications of the Message Authenticator Algorithm Slides      Hubert Garavel, Lina Marsso
12:00-12:30	MARS and VPT business meetings (everyone welcome)
12:30-14:00	Lunch
14:00-15:00	Tutorial Progress on Algorithms for Stateless Model Checking      Kostis Sagonas
15:00-16:00	Comparing different models of the same system Modeling a Cache Coherence Protocol with the Guarded Action Language Slides      Quentin L. Meunier, Yann Thierry-Mieg and Emmanuelle Encrenaz Ten Diverse Formal Models for a CBTC Automatic Train Supervision System Slides      Franco Mazzanti and Alessio Ferrari
16:00-16:30	Coffee Break
16:30-17:30	Modelling avionics and program equivalence A Modeling Framework for Schedulability Analysis of Distributed Avionics Systems Slides      Pujie Han, Zhengjun Zhai, Brian Nielsen and Ulrik Nyman Proving Equivalence Between Imperative and MapReduce Implementations Using Program Transformations Slides      Bernhard Beckert, Timo Bingmann, Moritz Kiefer, Peter Sanders, Mattias Ulbrich and Alexander Weigl

The proceedings for this workshop are published in the open access series Electronic Proceedings in Theoretical Computer Science (EPTCS). They can be found at http://eptcs.web.cse.unsw.edu.au/content.cgi?MARSVPT2018.

Submissions must be unpublished and not be submitted for publication elsewhere. Contributions are limited to 12 pages EPTCS style (not counting references and the appendices), but shorter extended abstracts are welcome. Appendices (of arbitrary length) can be used to present all details of a formalised model; the appendices will be part of the proceedings. In case a formal model is presented in some formalism or tool, such as timed automata for Uppaal or formal proofs for Isabelle/HOL, these models have to be submitted in totality as well, in the appendices and/or as an TAR or ZIP file, the contents of which, for accepted papers, will be made available in our Repository of Models for Formal Analysis of Real Systems.
Submissions must be in English and submitted in PDF format via EasyChair. The TAR or ZIP file with the model should be send as an email attachment to mars2018@mars-workshop.org. All submissions will be peer reviewed by at least three referees based on their novelty, relevance and technical merit. The proceedings will be published as part of the open access series Electronic Proceedings in Theoretical Computer Science (EPTCS).

Submission:	Friday January 12, 2018	Sunday, January 21, 2018
Notification:	Monday February 19, 2018
Final version:	Monday March 12, 2018
Workshop:	Friday April 20, 2018	(moved forward by one day by ETAPS organisers)

As mentioned above, we invite papers that present full Models of Real Systems, which may lay the basis for future formal analysis. The full Call for Papers can be found here.

Marsha Chechik	(University of Toronto, Canada)
Ansgar Fehnker	(University of Twente, The Netherlands)
Rob van Glabbeek	(Data61, CSIRO, Australia)
Jan Friso Groote	(Eindhoven University of Technology, The Netherlands)
Keijo Heljanko	(Aalto University, Finland)
Holger Hermanns	(Saarland University, Germany)
Eric Jenn	(IRT Saint Exupéry, France)
Marjan Sirjani	(Reykjavik University, Iceland)
Wendelin Serwe	(INRIA, France)
Pamela Zave	(AT&T Laboratories, New Jersey, USA)

The workshop is part of the European Joint Conferences on Theory and Practice of Software (ETAPS 2018). Information about venue and travelling in/to Greece can be found at the webpage of ETAPS.

mars2018@mars-workshop.org
 

Rob van Glabbeek	Wendelin Serwe
Data61, CSIRO Locked Bag 6016 Sydney, NSW 1466 Australia	INRIA Inovallée, CS 90051 38334 Montbonnot Cedex France