The ASMETA Approach to Safety Assurance of Software Systems

Safety-critical systems require development methods and processes that lead to provably correct systems in order to prevent catastrophic consequences due to system failure or unsafe operation. The use of models and formal analysis techniques is highly demanded both at design-time, to guarantee safety and other desired qualities already at the early stages of the system development, and at runtime, to address requirements assurance during the system operational stage. In this paper, we present the modeling features and analysis techniques supported by ASMETA (ASM mETAmodeling), a set of tools for the Abstract State Machines formal method. We show how the modeling and analysis approaches in ASMETA can be used during the design, development, and operation phases of the assurance process for safety-critical systems, and we illustrate the advantages of integrated use of tools as that provided by ASMETA.