Fighting Concurrency Bugs through Effect-Oriented Approaches

在所有类型的软件bug中，多线程并行程序中的并发性bug尤其令人头疼。它们广泛存在，并且由于多核机器的普及而变得越来越严重。现有的检测并发性bug的方法大多难以解决并发性bug的复杂原因——并发程序中多个线程之间的不确定性交互。这个项目旨在通过一种面向效果的方法来解决并发bug问题。具体来说，它将提供(1)对现实世界并发bug的错误传播过程的特征研究和深入理解；(2)面向效果的bug检测和测试框架，可以识别程序中的潜在故障，并通过反向分析搜索导致这些故障的并发错误；(3)利用上述错误传播信息并向软件开发人员提供补丁建议的bug修复工具；(4)一般的面向效果的哲学，可以指导其他与多线程并行程序相关的工具。这项研究将提高我们对并发软件可靠性问题的理解，提供大量的工具支持，以帮助降低软件开发和维护成本，并通过在广泛的平台上更快、更可靠的软件改善软件用户的日常体验。

Among all types of software bugs, concurrency bugs in multi-threaded parallel programs are especially troublesome. They widely exist and are becoming increasingly severe due to the pervasiveness of multi-core machines. Existing approaches to detecting concurrency bugs mostly struggle at the complicated cause of concurrency bugs --- non-deterministic interaction among multiple threads in concurrent programs.This project aims to address the concurrency bug problem through an effect-oriented approach. Specifically, it will provide (1) a characteristic study and a deep understanding of the error propagation process of real-world concurrency bugs; (2) an effect-oriented bug detection and testing framework that can identify potential failures in a program and search for concurrency bugs leading to these failures through backward analysis; (3) a bug-fixing tool that leverages the error propagation information identified above and suggests patches to software developers; (4) a general effect-oriented philosophy that can guide other tools related to multi-threaded parallel programs. This research will improve our understanding of the dependability problem of concurrent software, provide substantial tool support to help lower software development and maintenance costs, and improve software users' everyday experience through faster and more reliable software on a wide spectrum of platforms.