Integrating formal methods with testing for reliability estimation of component based systems
Debasmita Lohar, Soumyajit Dey · 2015
Large scale complex software systems are usually built following component based modeling and design methodologies. For such complex software, system level reliability estimation is a non-trivial problem due to the intricate combinatorial relationships which may exist between component reliabilities and the overall system level reliability. A formal modeling of the interactions among components in terms of reliability thus becomes a desirable design attribute. The present work proposes a method for reliability estimation of such systems, by leveraging techniques from the domain of program analysis. The overall system behavior including the interactions with external components is modeled by high-level behavioral descriptions tagged with reliability assertions. These assertions act as preconditions guaranteeing successful execution of components. We present an efficient algorithm for system level reliability estimation at a desired time instant along with suitable case studies illustrating the usefulness of the proposed approach.