Process Algebra with Nonstandard Timing

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Middelburg, Kees A.^;

Affiliations: Computing Science Department, Eindhoven University of Technology, Eindhoven, the Netherlands | Department of Philosophy, Utrecht University, Utrecht, the Netherlands

Abstract: The possibility of two or more actions to be performed consecutively at the same point in time is not excluded in the process algebras from the framework of process algebras with timing presented by Baeten and Middelburg [Handbook of Process Algebra, Elsevier, 2001, Chapter 10]. This possibility is useful in practice when describing and analyzing systems in which actions occur that are entirely independent. However, it is an abstraction of reality to assume that actions can be performed consecutively at the same point in time. In this paper, we propose a process algebra with timing in which this possibility is excluded, but nonstandard non-negative real numbers are included in the time domain. It is shown that this new process algebra generalizes the process algebras with timing from the aforementioned framework in a smooth and natural way.

Keywords: process algebra, timing, nonstandard timing, urgent actions

Journal: Fundamenta Informaticae, vol. 53, no. 1, pp. 55-77, 2002