Verification of ISO ACSE protocol specified in Estelle

The techniques for verifying protocols specified in Estelle have so far focused on translating the specifications into another form, such as finite state machines or Petri nets, for which tools of verification have already been implemented. All the present Estelle verification methods and tools impose some restrictions on the specifications to be verified: the techniques use a subset of Estelle or restrict the complexity of the specifications that can be verified; or the specifications need to be in a variant of Estelle, rather than standard Estelle. In the literature, Estelle verifications have been mainly reported for simple examples, like the alternating bit and abracadabra protocols. In this paper, we describe the verification of a real life protocol, the ISO Association Control Service Element (ACSE), specified in Estelle. The protocol properties verified are deadlock and livelock freeness. The Estelle specifications are translated into those of Numerical Petri Nets, which are then verified by a proven automated verification tool, PROTEAN. The merit of this approach is that no restriction needs to be imposed on the specifications, which can be fully based on standard Estelle.