Publication Date

2-2005

Comments

UTEP-CS-05-04

Abstract

In a pre- and post-conditions style specification, it is difficult to specify allowed sequences of method calls, often called protocols. However, the protocols are essential properties of reusable object-oriented classes and application frameworks, and the approaches based on the pre- and post-conditions, such as design by contracts (DBC) and formal behavioral interface specification languages (BISL), are being accepted as a practical and effective way of describing precise interfaces of (reusable) program modules. We propose a simple extension to JML, a BISL for Java, to specify protocol properties in an intuitive and concise manner. We also define a formal semantics of our extension and provide runtime checks. We believe that our approach can be easily adopted for other BISLs.

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