Model checking a cache coherence protocol of a Java DSM implementation

Jackal is a fine-grained distributed shared memory implementation of the Java programming language. It aims to implement Java’s memory model and allows multithreaded Java programs to run unmodified on a distributed memory system. It employs a multiple-writer cache coherence protocol. In this paper, we report on our analysis of this protocol. We present its formal specification in μ CRL, and discuss the abstractions that were made to avoid state explosion. Requirements were formulated and model checked with respect to several configurations. Our analysis revealed two errors in the implementation.