Epistemic Model Checking of Distributed Commit Protocols with Byzantine Faults

Omar Al-Bataineh, Mark Reynolds

Research output: Chapter in Book/Conference paperConference paperpeer-review

Abstract

The notion of knowledge-based program introduced by Halpern and Fagin provides a useful formalism for designing, analyzing, and optimizing distributed systems. This paper formulates the two phase commit protocol as a knowledge-based program and then an iterative process of model checking and counter-example guided refinement is followed to find concrete implementations of the program for the case of perfect recall semantic in the Byzantine failures context with synchronous reliable communication. We model several different kinds of Byzantine failures and verify different strategies to fight and mitigate them. We address a number of questions that have not been considered in the prior literature, viz., under what circumstances a sender can know that its transmission has been successful, and under what circumstances an agent can know that the coordinator is cheating, and find concrete answers to these questions. The paper describes also a methodology based on temporal-epistemic model checking technology that can be followed to verify the shortest and longest execution time of a distributed protocol and the scenarios that lead to them.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationProceedings - 2019 IEEE/ACM 7th International Workshop on Formal Methods in Software Engineering, FormaliSE 2019
PublisherIEEE, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Pages1-10
Number of pages10
ISBN (Electronic)9781728133737
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 May 2019
Event7th International Conference on Formal Methods in Software Engineering - Montreal, Canada
Duration: 27 May 201927 May 2019

Publication series

NameProceedings - 2019 IEEE/ACM 7th International Workshop on Formal Methods in Software Engineering, FormaliSE 2019

Conference

Conference7th International Conference on Formal Methods in Software Engineering
Abbreviated titleFormaliSE 2019
Country/TerritoryCanada
CityMontreal
Period27/05/1927/05/19
OtherThe 7th Conference on Formal Methods in Software Engineering, FormaliSE 2019, was organized as a one-day event in Montréal, Canada on 27 May. The event was attended by roughly 45 researchers, including people from industry as well as academia in the area of Formal Verification from around the globe. A detailed report can be found here.

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