Software model checking of liveness properties via transition invariants

Model checking is an automated method to prove safety and liveness properties for finite systems. Software model checking uses predicate abstraction to compute invariants and thus prove safety properties for infinite-state programs. We address the limitation of current software model checking methods to safety properties. Our results are a characterization of the validity of a liveness property by the existence of transition invariants, and a method that uses transition predicate abstraction to compute transition invariants and thus prove liveness properties for infinite-state programs.