Introduction to Program Analysis

The aim of this lecture is to give a basic introduction to some of the techniques and approaches used in program analysis.

Static program analysis attempts to determine non-trivial program properties by formally inspecting and analysing the source code rather than by observing the dynamical behaviour of a program. Although it is well known that in principle it is impossible to determine all properties of a program, it is still possible to obtain safe and correct answers to many questions. Based on the results of a static analysis we can, for example, eliminate so-called `dead code' or redundant expressions, or we can give guarantees that some runtime errors (e.g. out of bound array access) will not occur.

Therefore, program analysis plays an essential role for compiler optimisation. It is also crucial for important applications in areas such as computer security and performance optimisation.