🚀 go-pugleaf

Hi all

As part of my Ph.D. thesis, I wrote a development environment for Estelle
specifications, which, believe it or not, runs under DOS (there is a Sun
port, but it is batch-oriented and not nearly as nice). The tools involved
are:

PEW - the Protocol Engineering Workbench integrated environment
EC  - command-line Estelle compiler
EI  - stand-alone interpreter for use with EC
PA  - Performance Analyser (solves embedded Markov chain models)
REACH - reachability analyser for detecting problems from behaviour graphs
GP  - graph processor, for performance predictions from behaviour graphs

The PEW program includes a screen editor, compiler and interpreter for 
Estelle. It translates Estelle into an intermediate code (E-code), which
is then interpreted. The interpreter has multiple windows, lets you set
breakpoints on different events, view queues (and delete interactions),
jump around between processes, etc.

EC and EI are stand-alone versions of the compiler and interpreter, allowing
bigger files to be handled. EI also performs a novel exploratory procedure
not unlike a state space exploration, and outputs what I call a behaviour
graph, similar to a timed reachability graph. The REACH program can check
this graph, and help identify livelock and deadlock problems. The GP 
program can take a specific set of parameters describing delay values and
message loss probabilities, and predict the throughput rate of transitions
in the specification under that set of parameter values. Obviously, these
techniques require the system as a whole to have a finite number of global
states, and the smaller the state space, the faster they occur. The tools
are more useful for teaching and experimenting with small protocols than
engineering industrial-strength, highly complex protocols.

I have decided, with agreement from my supervisor, to place these programs
in the public domain. As we are talking about half a megabyte of compressed
data, I thought I would see if there is an interest before posting them
on the net. So, if you think these tools would be of use to you, please
send me mail. I will determine my next step from the response I receive.

Regards
Graham

-- 
Graham Wheeler                     | "That which is weak conquers the strong,
Software Systems Engineer/Student  | that which is soft conquers the hard."
Aztec Information Management/UCT   | 		Lao Tzu - Tao Te Ching Ch. 78
gram@aim1.aztec.co.za / gram@cs.uct.ac.za