Introductory Paper

In today’s competitive market designing of digital systems (hardware as well as software) faces tremendous challenges. In fact, notwithstanding an ever decreasing project budget, time to market and product lifetime, designers are faced with an ever increasing system complexity and customer expected quality. The above situation calls for better and better formal verification techniques at all steps of the design flow. This special issue is devoted to publishing revised versions of contributions first presented at the 12th Advanced Research Working Conference on Correct Hardware Design and Verification Methods (CHARME) held 21–24 October 2003 in L’Aquila, Italy. Authors of well regarded papers from CHARME’03 were invited to submit to this special issue. All papers included here have been suitably extended and have undergone an independent round of reviewing.     

MetateM: An introduction

In this paper a methodology for the use of temporal logic as an executable imperative language is introduced. The approach, which provides a concrete framework, calledMetateM, for executing temporal formulae, is motivated and illustrated through examples. In addition, this introduction provides references to further, more detailed, work relating to theMetateM approach to executable logics.     

An improved BioHashing for human authentication

Given the recent explosion of interest in human authentication, verification based on tokenized pseudo-random numbers and the user specific biometric feature (BioHashing) has received much attention. These methods have significant functional advantages over sole biometrics i.e. zero equal error rate. The main drawback of the base BioHashing method proposed in the literature relies in exhibiting low performance when an “impostor” B steals the pseudo-random numbers of A and he tries to authenticate as A. In this paper, we introduce some ideas to improve the base BioHashing approach in order to maintain a very low equal error rate when nobody steals the Hash key, and to reach good performance also when an “impostor” steals the Hash key.     

Service life planning and performance requirements

Service life planning comprises a model for the determination of a reasonable expected service life for buildings and components, and it establishes a routine for the assessment of design alternatives. A design option is considered reasonable when it meets or exceeds performance requirements over time that have been drawn up specifically for the specific project. Due to this assessment reference, there is a very evident link to the concept of performance-based building. Any stakeholder involved in the value chain or in the design process of the building, as well as regulators and building users, can express performance requirements. Identified requirements, both in relevance and in quality, will vary with the stakeholder and his/her perspective of interest. As building sector manufacturers develop most products with reference to standards rather than with reference to specific requirements, there is no direct link from user requirements to the product design. Instead, the building designer has the responsibility to ensure performance requirements are met by the performance of products integrated into the design. As these design decisions also have to be made at the material and component level, a performance-based building would benefit from an established rationale that enables the communication of performance requirements across the relevant system levels in the relevant design processes. A path for the connection of the established concepts of service life planning and performance-based building is presented. The aim is to identify key elements that need to be developed for the successful linkage of performance-based building with service life planning.     

Two-class fingerprint matcher

We present a system for fingerprint verification that approaches the problem as a two-class pattern recognition problem. The features extracted by “FingerCode” are used to capture the ridge strength. This feature vector is then classified as genuine or impostor according to a novel approach to handle the fingerprint verification as a two-class problem. Moreover, we show that extracting the features from sub-images around the core permits to better represent the local information.     

面向软件动态演化的需求建模及其模型规范化

针对目前需求工程阶段对软件动态演化考虑不足的现状,在分析软件动态演化面临的挑战的基础上,设计了面向动态演化的需求元模型(dynamic-evolution-orientedrequi rements meta-model,DERM)。该元模型以特征为基本部件,按特征组合的方式建立需求模型,需求模型由行为特征和属性特征组成。行为特征被区分为计算行为特征和交互行为特征,以实现计算和交互的相对隔离;属性特征通过其作用域,指定其在行为特征模型中的作用范围,从而将行为特征模型和属性特征模型统一为需求模型。在此基础上,讨论了需求模型的参照完整性、依赖一致性和互斥一致性,并进一步把需求模型规范化为需求模型第一范式到第三范式,需求模型规范化的过程提供了一种保证需求模型一致性的方法。最后通过案例研究,表明了该方法的可行性及其对软件动态演化的有效支持。     

处理器验证激励在线筛选技术

如何生成高质量的验证激励是功能验证中的核心问题之一.随着功能验证的不断进行,验证激励的有效性也随之降低.为了提高验证激励的质量,提出一种在线筛选技术来处理验证激励.该技术采用单分类支持向量机来在线地构建分类器,以对新生成的验证激励是否冗余进行预测,如果是冗余的,则不进入仿真阶段进行仿真.在此基础上,进一步提出指令序列核函数来衡量不同指令序列的相似程度.实验结果表明,与约束随机生成技术相比,文中技术可以减少约83%的验证激励及79%的验证时间.     

MPEG-2／4AAC音频编码模块的验证

先进音频编码（AdvancedAudioCoding,AAC）以其多声道、多采样率、高压缩比、音质好等特点被广泛使用。文中首先介绍了MPEG-2／4AAC音频编码技术;接着基于MPEG-2／4AAC音频编码原理,开发了时钟复位、寄存器配置和音频数据收发的BFM模型,搭建了音频编码模块的RTL级虚拟验证平台,同时归纳了验证项;最后基于此验证平台和验证项,对设计进行了全面的仿真验证。实践证明该验证方法效率高、收敛快、覆盖率高,取得了较好的效果,为后续的FPGA平台验证和芯片应用提供了有力的保证。     

Interpreting the negative mood-helping literature via "mega"-analysis: A contrary view.

"Mega"-analysis was developed by M. Carlson and N. Miller (see record 1987-31249-001) as an extension of traditional meta-analytic procedures for conducting integrative reviews of existing research literatures. One such mega-analysis was conducted by Carlson and Miller to synthesize the literature on the relation between negative mood states and helping. That analysis found no support for a theoretical account (negative state relief) that had been confirmed previously by using various experimental approaches. In an attempt to reconcile the discrepancy, the logic and methods used in Carlson and Miller's mega-analysis of the negative mood-helping literature were examined, and several serious problems were found. These problems are discussed, and data are presented to show that the results of that mega-analysis, and perhaps all mega-analyses, should not be viewed with confidence. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2010 APA, all rights reserved)