# Using the propverify library to verify Rust programs

The goal of the tools and library in this repository is to let you verify interesting things about non-trivial programs. Unfortunately, interesting/non-trivial programs are too large for introducing you to a tool so, for now, we will consider this trivial program.

proptest! {
#[test]
fn multiply(a in 1..=1000u32, b in 1..=1000u32) {
let r = a*b;
prop_assert!(1 <= r && r < 1000000);
}
}


This program

• generates two values a and b in the range [1..1000]
• multiplies a and b
• asserts that their product is in the range 1..1000000

In this note, we shall do the following to check this code

1. create a test crate
2. fuzz the crate using proptest
3. verify the crate using propverify and cargo-verify
4. verify the crate using propverify and Crux-mir

### Workaround for “compilation error”

Before we really get started… The cargo-verify tool sometimes gets confused by previous compilations. If you get an error message involving compilation error, try running cargo clean and try again.

Hopefully we’ll make cargo-verify more robust soon.

## Creating a test crate

The Rust compiler, KLEE, and Seahorn are in the Dockerfile so start the Docker image by running

../docker/run


All remaining commands in this file will be run in this docker image.

(It is usually easiest to run this in one terminal while using a separate editor to edit the files in another terminal.)

To try the above example, we will create a crate in which to experiment with this code.

cargo new try-propverify
cd try-propverify

cat >> Cargo.toml  << "EOF"

[target.'cfg(verify)'.dependencies]
propverify = { path="/home/rust-verification-tools/propverify" }

[target.'cfg(not(verify))'.dependencies]
proptest = { version = "*" }

[features]
verifier-klee = ["propverify/verifier-klee"]
verifier-crux = ["propverify/verifier-crux"]
verifier-seahorn = ["propverify/verifier-seahorn"]
EOF

cat > src/main.rs  << "EOF"
#[cfg(not(verify))]
use proptest::prelude::*;
#[cfg(verify)]
use propverify::prelude::*;

proptest! {
#[test]
fn multiply(a in 1..=1000u32, b in 1..=1000u32) {
let r = a*b;
prop_assert!(1 <= r && r < 1000000);
}
}
EOF


## Fuzzing with proptest

Since proptest is a normal library, we can fuzz the program using cargo test.

This will generate output a bit like this

running 1 test
test multiply ... ok

test result: ok. 1 passed; 0 failed; 0 ignored; 0 measured; 0 filtered out


Which means that the fuzzer has failed to find a bug.

(As we shall see in a moment, the test actually has a bug. We have deliberately chosen ranges that are large enough that the current version of proptest is unlikely to find the bug.)

## Verifying with propverify using cargo-verify

To verify the program using propverify, we use the cargo-verify tool to compile the program and verify the program using one of the verification backends (currently we support KLEE and Seahorn).

cargo clean
cargo-verify --backend=klee --tests --verbose


The program above has a deliberate error and KLEE reports the error

Running 1 test(s)
test multiply ... ERROR

test result: ERROR. 0 passed; 1 failed
VERIFICATION_RESULT: ERROR


Running cargo-verify with the option --backend=seahorn will give the same result, but with Seahorn as the verification backend, instead of KLEE.

While it is nice that it has found a bug, we need more detail before we can understand and fix the bug. After finding the bug, we can “replay” the test to see some concrete data values that it fails on.

(The Seahorn backend does not support replay at the moment)

(Although it makes no difference in this small example, it is usually best to use --test=... instead of --tests to focus on a single failing test at a time.)

cargo-verify --backend=klee --test=multiply --replay


This produces additional output that shows that KLEE explored two paths through the program: one that passes and one that fails.

The first path has value a = 1 and b = 1 and it passes the test.

    Test input try-propverify/kleeout-multiply/test000001.ktest

running 1 test
Value a = 1
Value b = 1
test multiply ... ok

test result: ok. 1 passed; 0 failed; 0 ignored; 0 measured; 0 filtered out


The second path has value a = 1000 and b = 1000 and it fails the test that a*b < 1000000.

    Test input try-propverify/kleeout-multiply/test000002.ktest
Finished test [unoptimized + debuginfo] target(s) in 0.02s
Running target/x86_64-apple-darwin/debug/deps/try_propverify-bb37abd6d1dc60ef
thread 'multiply' panicked at 'assertion failed: 1 <= r && r < 1000000', src/main.rs:10:9
note: run with RUST_BACKTRACE=1 environment variable to display a backtrace
error: test failed, to rerun pass '--bin try-propverify'

running 1 test
Value a = 1000
Value b = 1000
test multiply ... FAILED

failures:

failures:
multiply

test result: FAILED. 0 passed; 1 failed; 0 ignored; 0 measured; 0 filtered out


Seeing this failing example, it is obvious that the comparision ‘<’ should be changed to ‘<=’

    prop_assert!(1 <= r && r <= 1000000);


With that fix, we can rerun KLEE and see that the test passes

cargo-verify --backend=klee --tests --replay
Running 1 test(s)
test multiply ... ok

test result: ok. 1 passed; 0 failed
VERIFICATION_RESULT: VERIFIED


## Verifying with propverify using Crux-mir

[The following does not run in docker at present]

(if you fixed the assertion as discussed above, revert the fix)

To verify the program using propverify and Crux-mir

cargo clean
RUSTFLAGS='--cfg verify' cargo crux-test --features verifier-crux


The program above has a deliberate error and Crux-mir reports the error

test try_propverify/17clqo26::multiply[0]: FAILED

failures:

---- try_propverify/17clqo26::multiply[0] counterexamples ----
Failure for panicking::begin_panic, called from try_propverify/17clqo26::multiply[0]
in try_propverify/17clqo26::multiply[0] at internal


As the test uses Rust’s std::assert macro which invokes panic! the failure Crux-mir detects is the call to panic. To get a more descriptive failure we can replace assert! in src/main.rs with verifier::assert!, and run the verifier again

RUSTFLAGS='--cfg verify' cargo crux-test --features verifier-crux



This time we get the following report which shows the assertion that failed and its line number

test try_propverify/17clqo26::multiply[0]: FAILED

failures:

---- try_propverify/17clqo26::multiply[0] counterexamples ----
Failure for MIR assertion at src/main.rs:10:9:
VERIFIER: assertion failed: 1 <= r && r < 1000000
in try_propverify/17clqo26::multiply[0] at ./lib/crucible/lib.rs:50:17


## Which is better: fuzzing or verification?

This example is intended as a quick introduction to using property-based testing using either fuzzing (with proptest) or verification tools (with propverify).

In this carefully chosen example, proptest missed a bug that propverify found. We could also have chosen an example where proptest quickly finds a bug but propverify runs for hours or days without producing a result.

The point of this example (and the point of making propverify compatible with proptest) is not that one approach is better than another but that they are complementary and you should use both fuzzing and verification tools.

[This post was originally posted as part of the Rust verification project]

Written on September 3, 2020.
The opinions expressed are my own views and not my employer's.