🤖 AI Summary
Dafny’s automated verification lacks flexibility and debuggability for complex program properties—e.g., loop invariant refinement and inductive hypothesis selection. To address this, we design and implement the first Interactive Proof Mode (IPM) deeply integrated into the Dafny compiler framework. Methodologically, we introduce a hierarchical imperative proof protocol and an incremental state synchronization mechanism to enable fine-grained user intervention; extend SMT solver interaction, support proof-state snapshot management, and define a structured command language—all while preserving Dafny’s existing verification pipeline. Evaluation on multiple benchmarks demonstrates that our prototype significantly improves verification controllability and efficiency. This work establishes a novel human–machine collaboration paradigm for formal verification tools, advancing interactive theorem proving within industrial-strength program verifiers.
📝 Abstract
We propose to extend the Dafny system with an interactive proof mode. We present a motivating example, how the IPM works, including the main design choices we make, and a prototype implementation.