Program slicing is a technique for simplifying programs by focusing on selected aspects of their behaviour. Current slicing techniques still have much room for improvement, such as handling programs written in multiple languages. Using the modern compilation framework LLVM (Low-Level Virtual Machine), we attempt in this project to meet this improvement by presenting a language-independent context-sensitive slicing approach, called Symbolic Program Slicing, including both backward and forward static slicing. In the symbolic slicing approach, slices are stored symbolically rather than procedure being re-analysed (cf. procedure summaries). For comparison, we systematically adapt SDG-based (system dependence graph) slicing methods with IFDS (Interprocedural Finite Distributive Subset analysis) to statically slice LLVM IR (intermediate representation).
llvm-slicing is written in Haskell. It depends on LLVM 3.0-3.4 and llvm-config must be in your PATH. It is built and packaged using Cabal.
- Install the package
cabal-installfrom your system's package manager (with e.g.apt-get);
Verify thatcabalis installed and update its dependency list withcabal update git clonethis repository, andcdto thellvm-slicingsource directory (src) to build/install:cabal install.
This will compilellvm-slicingand install it to your~/.cabal/bindirectory- Add this directory to your
PATH;
Verify that yourPATHis set up correctly withwhich llvm-slicing
Alternatively, download our pre-built binary for Ubuntu 12.04 LTS (64 bit) with LLVM 3.3:
llvm-slicing_llvm-3.3_x86-64_Ubuntu-12.04.2.tar.bz2
Then unzip it and put the binary llvm-slicing in a directory that is on your PATH
Currently, llvm-slicing includes four static slicers based on corresponding slicing methods, i.e. Symbolic slicing, Weiser slicing, SDG-based slicing (using intraprocedure slice result to generate summary edges), and IFDS-based slicing (using IFDS method to generate summary edges). To get detail help infomation:
$ llvm-slicing -h
llvm-slicing [-c|--criterion VARIABLES] [-d|--direction DIRECTION]
[-m|--method SLICE_METHOD] [-p|--isParallel ISPARALLEL]
[-t|--timeout TIMEOUT] [-g|--graph GRAPH_SHOW]
[-o|--output FILE/DIR] FILE
Available options:
-h,--help Show this help text
-c,--criterion VARIABLES The criterion variables (with the form of Var@Fun,e.g. x@main) for slicing.
If null, just output the slice table for all single variables.
-d,--direction DIRECTION The type of output to slice: Fwd, Bwd or Both. Default: Bwd
-m,--method SLICE_METHOD The slice algorithm: Symbolic,Weiser,SDG or IFDS. Default: Symbolic
-p,--isParallel ISPARALLEL Whether or not travelling SCC in callgraph in parallel. Default: False
-t,--timeout TIMEOUT The timeout (sec.) for running slicer. Default: 1800
-g,--graph GRAPH_SHOW Print related graphs: Sdg,Cg,Cdg,Cfg,Icfg,Pdt or Dt.
-o,--output FILE/DIR The destination of a file output
FILE The input file which can be bitcode,llvm assembly, or C/CPP sourcecode
For a multi-programs library, it must be converted to LLVM bitcode (e.g. using the whole-program LLVM wrapper to compile the library) before using llvm-slicing to slice it.
For a simple C program, sum3.c, its backward static slice table with symbolic slicing method:
$ llvm-slicing sum3.c
Backward Static SliceTable:
Variable SrcLineNumbers
------------------------------
a@add {"sum3.c: [9,11,12,13,15,27,28,33,40,41]"}
b@add {"sum3.c: [9,12,13,15,27,28,33,40,41]"}
i@main {"sum3.c: [9,12,13,15,28,33,40,41]"}
n@main {"sum3.c: [9]"}
sum@main {"sum3.c: [9,11,12,13,15,27,28,33,40,41]"}
tmp@inc {"sum3.c: [9,12,13,15,28,33,40,41]"}
x@A {"sum3.c: [9,11,12,13,15,27,28,33,40,41]"}
y@A {"sum3.c: [9,12,13,15,28,33,40,41]"}
z@inc {"sum3.c: [9,12,13,15,28,33,40,41]"}
For simplicity, here backward slicing criteria can be automatically generated to slice on the last instruction (the first instruction for forward slicing criteria) of the main procedure for each global variable, and on the last instruction (the first definition instruction in forward slicing) of each procedure for each local variable allocated (declared) in the procedure.
To get the final IR slice result of the local variable, %z, in the procedure @inc (on its last instruction):
$ llvm-slicing sum3.c -c z@inc
Backward Static Slice for ["z@inc"]:
<SourceLines> ["sum3.c: [9,12,13,15,28,33,40,41]"]:
%n = alloca i32 , align 4
%i = alloca i32 , align 4
%4 = call i32 @__isoc99_scanf ( i8* i8* getelementptr ( [3 x i8]* @.str1 , i32 0, i32 0 ), i32* %n )
store i32 1 , i32* %i , align 4
%7 = phi i32 [ [%.pre, %10], [1, %0] ]
%8 = load i32* %n , align 4
%9 = icmp sle i32 %7 , %8
br i1 %9 , label %10 , label %11
call void @A ( i32* %sum, i32* %i )
%.pre = load i32* %i , align 4
i32* %y
call void @inc ( i32* %y )
i32* %a
i32* %b
%3 = load i32* %a , align 4
%4 = load i32* %b , align 4
%5 = add nsw i32 %3 , %4
store i32 %5 , i32* %a , align 4
i32* %z
%tmp = alloca i32 , align 4
store i32* %z , i32** %1 , align 8
store i32 1 , i32* %tmp , align 4
call void @add ( i32* %z, i32* %tmp )
To get its forward static slice table with IFDS-based slicing method:
$ llvm-slicing sum3.c -d Fwd -m IFDS
Forward Static SliceTable:
Variable SrcLineNumbers
------------------------------
a@add {"sum3.c: [13,15,16,18,19,20,23,27,28,29,31,33,35,37,40,41,42]"}
b@add {"sum3.c: [13,15,16,18,19,20,23,27,28,29,31,33,35,37,40,41,42]"}
i@main {"sum3.c: [12,13,15,16,18,19,20,23,27,28,29,31,33,35,37,40,41,42]"}
n@main {"sum3.c: [9,13,15,16,18,19,20,23,27,28,29,31,33,35,37,40,41,42]"}
sum@main {"sum3.c: [11,18,33]"}
tmp@inc {"sum3.c: [13,15,16,18,19,20,23,27,28,29,31,33,35,37,40,41,42]"}
x@A {"sum3.c: [18,33]"}
y@A {"sum3.c: [13,15,16,18,19,20,23,27,28,29,31,33,35,37,40,41,42]"}
z@inc {"sum3.c: [13,15,16,18,19,20,23,27,28,29,31,33,35,37,40,41,42]"}
To print its LLVM IR SDG:
$ llvm-slicing sum3.c -g Sdg
For more slice results of sum3.c, please visit the folder test/C/sample.