{"title":"Dynamic Fault Tree Analysis Using Input/Output Interactive Markov Chains","authors":"H. Boudali, P. Crouzen, M. Stoelinga","doi":"10.1109/DSN.2007.37","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/DSN.2007.37","url":null,"abstract":"Dynamic fault trees (DFT) extend standard fault trees by allowing the modeling of complex system components' behaviors and interactions. Being a high level model and easy to use, DFT are experiencing a growing success among reliability engineers. Unfortunately, a number of issues still remains when using DFT. Briefly, these issues are (1) a lack of formality (syntax and semantics), (2) limitations in modular analysis and thus vulnerability to the state-space explosion problem, and (3) lack in modular model-building. We use the input/output interactiveMarkov chain (I/O-IMC) formalism to analyse DFT. I/O-IMC have a precise semantics and are an extension of continuous-time Markov chains with input and output actions. In this paper, using the I/OI-MC framework, we address and resolve issues (2) and (3) mentioned above. We also show, through some examples, how one can readily extend the DFT modeling capabilities using the I/O-IMC framework.","PeriodicalId":405751,"journal":{"name":"37th Annual IEEE/IFIP International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks (DSN'07)","volume":"16 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2007-06-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"133316736","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Architecture-Level Soft Error Analysis: Examining the Limits of Common Assumptions","authors":"Xiaodong Li, S. Adve, P. Bose, J. Rivers","doi":"10.1109/DSN.2007.15","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/DSN.2007.15","url":null,"abstract":"This paper concerns the validity of a widely used method for estimating the architecture-level mean time to failure (MTTF) due to soft errors. The method first calculates the failure rate for an architecture-level component as the product of its raw error rate and an architecture vulnerability factor (AVF). Next, the method calculates the system failure rate as the sum of the failure rates (SOFR) of all components, and the system MTTF as the reciprocal of this failure rate. Both steps make significant assumptions. We investigate the validity of the AVF+SOFR method across a large design space, using both mathematical and experimental techniques with real program traces from SPEC 2000 benchmarks and synthesized traces to simulate longer real-world workloads. We show that AVF+SOFR is valid for most of the realistic cases under current raw error rates. However, for some realistic combinations of large systems, long-running workloads with large phases, and/or large raw error rates, the MTTF calculated using AVF+SOFR shows significant-discrepancies from that using first principles. We also show that SoftArch, a previously proposed alternative method that does not make the AVF+SOFR assumptions, does not exhibit the above discrepancies.","PeriodicalId":405751,"journal":{"name":"37th Annual IEEE/IFIP International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks (DSN'07)","volume":"29 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2007-06-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"132674986","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Reliability Techniques for RFID-Based Object Tracking Applications","authors":"Ahmad Rahmati, Lin Zhong, M. Hiltunen, R. Jana","doi":"10.1109/DSN.2007.81","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/DSN.2007.81","url":null,"abstract":"Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology has the potential to dramatically improve numerous industrial practices. However, it still faces many challenges, including security and reliability, which may limit its use in many application scenarios. While security has received considerable attention, reliability has escaped much of the research scrutiny. In this work, we investigate the reliability challenges in RFID-based tracking applications, where objects (e.g., pallets, packages, and people) tagged with low-cost passive RFID tags pass by the RFID reader's read zone. Our experiments show that the reliability of tag identification is affected by several factors, including the inter-tag distance, the distance between the tag and antenna, the orientation of the tag with respect to the antenna, and the location of the tag on the object. We demonstrate that RFID system reliability can be significantly improved with the application of simple redundancy techniques.","PeriodicalId":405751,"journal":{"name":"37th Annual IEEE/IFIP International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks (DSN'07)","volume":"357 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2007-06-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"114796344","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Inherent Time Redundancy (ITR): Using Program Repetition for Low-Overhead Fault Tolerance","authors":"Vimal K. Reddy, E. Rotenberg","doi":"10.1109/DSN.2007.59","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/DSN.2007.59","url":null,"abstract":"A new approach is proposed that exploits repetition inherent in programs to provide low-overhead transient fault protection in a processor. Programs repeatedly execute the same instructions within close time periods. This can be viewed as a time redundant re-execution of a program, except that inputs to these inherent time redundant (ITR) instructions vary. Nevertheless, certain microarchitectural events in the processor are independent of the input and only depend on the program instructions. Such events can be recorded and confirmed when ITR instructions repeat. In this paper, we use ITR to detect transient faults in the fetch and decode units of a processor pipeline, avoiding costly approaches like structural duplication or explicit time redundant execution.","PeriodicalId":405751,"journal":{"name":"37th Annual IEEE/IFIP International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks (DSN'07)","volume":"22 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2007-06-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121986711","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Augmenting Branch Predictor to Secure Program Execution","authors":"Yixin Shi, Gyungho Lee","doi":"10.1109/DSN.2007.19","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/DSN.2007.19","url":null,"abstract":"Although there are various ways to exploit software vulnerabilities for malicious attacks, the attacks always result in unexpected behavior in program execution, deviating from what the programmer/user intends to do. Program execution blindly follows the execution path specified by control flow transfer instructions with the targets generated at run-time without any validation. An enhancement is therefore proposed to secure program execution by introducing a validation mechanism over control flow transfer instructions at micro-architecture level. The proposed scheme, as a behavior-based protection, treats a triplet of the indirect branch's location, its target address, and the execution path preceding it as a behavior signature of program execution and validates it at run-time. The first two pieces of information can prevent an adversary from overwriting control data and introducing foreign code or impossible targets to redirect an indirect branch. The last one is necessary to defeat the attacks that use a legitimate target but follow an unintended execution path. Interestingly, the branch predictor is found to contain the signature information already and doing a portion of the validation when resolving the branch, thus greatly reducing the validation frequency. An enhancement of branch target buffer (BTB) entry together with a signature table implemented in the form of a Bloom filter in hardware is proposed to incorporate the validation into the processor's pipeline, providing a new defense in the processor architecture to secure program execution.","PeriodicalId":405751,"journal":{"name":"37th Annual IEEE/IFIP International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks (DSN'07)","volume":"63 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2007-06-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"126848247","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Josef Widder, G. Gridling, Bettina Weiss, J. Blanquart
{"title":"Synchronous Consensus with Mortal Byzantines","authors":"Josef Widder, G. Gridling, Bettina Weiss, J. Blanquart","doi":"10.1109/DSN.2007.91","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/DSN.2007.91","url":null,"abstract":"We consider the problem of reaching agreement in synchronous systems under a fault model whose severity lies between Byzantine and crash faults. For these \"mortal\" Byzantine faults, we assume that faulty processes take a finite number of arbitrary steps before they eventually crash. After discussing several application examples where this model is justified, we present and prove correct a consensus algorithm that tolerates a minority of faulty processes; i.e., more faults can be tolerated compared to classic Byzantine faults. We also show that the algorithm is optimal regarding the required number of processes and that no algorithm can solve consensus with just a majority of correct processes in a bounded number of rounds under our fault assumption. Finally, we consider more restricted fault models that allow to further reduce the required number of processes.","PeriodicalId":405751,"journal":{"name":"37th Annual IEEE/IFIP International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks (DSN'07)","volume":"4 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2007-06-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"128502453","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
A. Bondavalli, A. Ceccarelli, Lorenzo Falai, M. Vadursi
{"title":"Foundations of Measurement Theory Applied to the Evaluation of Dependability Attributes","authors":"A. Bondavalli, A. Ceccarelli, Lorenzo Falai, M. Vadursi","doi":"10.1109/DSN.2007.52","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/DSN.2007.52","url":null,"abstract":"Increasing interest is being paid to quantitative evaluation based on measurements of dependability attributes and metrics of computer systems and infrastructures. Despite measurands are generally sensibly identified, different approaches make it difficult to compare different results. Moreover, measurement tools are seldom recognized for what they are: measuring instruments. In this paper, many measurement tools, present in the literature, are critically evaluated at the light of metrology concepts and rules. With no claim of being exhaustive, the paper (i) investigates if and how deeply such tools have been validated in accordance to measurement theory, and (ii) tries to evaluate (if possible) their measurement properties. The intention is to take advantage of knowledge available in a recognized discipline such as metrology and to propose criteria and indicators taken from such discipline to improve the quality of measurements performed in evaluation of dependability attributes.","PeriodicalId":405751,"journal":{"name":"37th Annual IEEE/IFIP International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks (DSN'07)","volume":"19 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2007-06-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121589935","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Workshop on Architecting Dependable Systems (WADS 2007)","authors":"R. Lemos, F. Giandomenico, C. Gacek","doi":"10.1109/DSN.2007.105","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/DSN.2007.105","url":null,"abstract":"This workshop summary gives a brief overview of the workshop on \"Architecting Dependable Systems\" held in conjunction with DSN 2007. The main aim of this workshop is to promote cross-fertilization between the software architecture and dependability communities. We believe that both of them will benefit from clarifying approaches that have been previously tested and have succeeded as well as those that have been tried but have not yet been shown to be successful.","PeriodicalId":405751,"journal":{"name":"37th Annual IEEE/IFIP International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks (DSN'07)","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2006-06-25","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"131567907","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Fast Abstracts","authors":"Hiroshi Nakamura","doi":"10.1109/DSN.2007.47","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/DSN.2007.47","url":null,"abstract":"Fast Abstracts are brief two page presentations, either on new ideas, opinion pieces, or a project update. They cover wide variety of issues within the field of dependable systems and networks. They are also designed to offer an opportunity for late-breaking results, partial results, or work in progress to be reported in a timely fashion. As such, they are lightly reviewed by the Fast Abstracts Program Committee and are not subjected to the rigorous referee process for regular DSN papers. The late submission deadline and expedited screening, along with the corresponding 5-minute talk during DSN, allow for very rapid dissemination and timely feedback from the community.","PeriodicalId":405751,"journal":{"name":"37th Annual IEEE/IFIP International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks (DSN'07)","volume":"99 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"130621671","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Student Forum","authors":"F. Jahanian","doi":"10.1109/DSN.2007.89","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1109/DSN.2007.89","url":null,"abstract":"The Student Forum at DSN provides an opportunity for students currently working in the area of dependable computing to present and discuss their research objectives, approach and preliminary results. The Forum is centered on a conference track during which the selected student research papers are presented. Student Forum research papers are brief three-page single-authored presentations of ongoing research by graduate students.","PeriodicalId":405751,"journal":{"name":"37th Annual IEEE/IFIP International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks (DSN'07)","volume":"1 1","pages":"0"},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"1900-01-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121448598","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}