Fighting Concurrency Bugs through Effect-Oriented Approaches

在所有类型的软件错误中，多线程并行程序中的并发错误尤其麻烦。它们广泛存在，并且由于多核机器的普及而变得日益严重。现有的检测并发错误的方法大多难以解决并发错误的复杂原因-并发程序中多个线程之间的非确定性交互。这个项目旨在通过一种面向效果的方法来解决并发错误问题。具体地说，它将提供(1)对真实世界并发错误的错误传播过程的特征研究和深入理解；(2)面向效果的错误检测和测试框架，它可以识别程序中的潜在错误，并通过反向分析寻找导致这些错误的并发错误；(3)错误修复工具，它利用上面识别的错误传播信息，并向软件开发人员建议补丁；(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认识，为降低软件开发和维护成本提供实质性的工具支持，并通过更快、更可靠的软件在广泛的平台上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.