Temporal logic comes in two varieties: linear-time temporal logic assumes implicit universal quantification over all paths that are generated by system moves; branching-time temporal logic allows explicit existential and universal quantification over all paths. We introduce a third, more general variety of temporal logic: alternating-time temporal logic offers selective quantification over those paths that are possible outcomes of games, such as the game in which the system and the environment alternate moves. While linear-time and branching-time logics are natural specification languages for closed systems, alternating-time logics are natural specification languages for open systems. For example, by preceding the temporal operator "eventually" with a selective path quantifier, we can specify that in the game between the system and the environment, the system has a strategy to reach a certain state. Also the problems of receptiveness, realizability, and controllability can be formulated as model-checking problems for alternating-time formulas.

Weighted timed automata extend timed automata with costs on both locations and transitions. In this framework we study the optimal reachability and the optimal control synthesis problems for the automata with acyclic control graphs. This class of automata is relevant for some practical problems such as some static scheduling problems or air-trac control problems. We give a nondeterministic polynomial time algorithm to solve the decision version of the considered optimal reachability problem. This algorithm matches the known lower bound on the reachability for acyclic timed automata, and thus the problem is NPcomplete. We also solve in doubly exponential time the corresponding control synthesis problem.

The rapid development of complex and safety-critical systems requires the use of reliable verification methods and tools for system design (synthesis). Many systems of interest are reactive, in the sense that their behavior depends on the interaction with the environment. A natural framework to model them is a two-player game: the system versus the environment. In this context, the central problem is to determine the existence of a winning strategy according to a given winning condition. We focus on real-time systems, and choose to model the related game as a nondeterministic timed automaton. We express winning conditions by formulas of the branching-time temporal logic TCTL. While timed games have been studied in the literature, timed games with dense-time winning conditions constitute a new research topic. The main result of this paper is an exponential-time algorithm to check for the existence of a winning strategy for TCTL games where equality is not allowed in the timing constraints. Our approach consists on translating to timed tree automata both the game graph and the winning condition, thus reducing the considered decision problem to the emptiness problem for this class of automata. The proposed algorithm matches the known lower bound on timed games. Moreover, if we relax the limitation we have placed on the timing constraints, the problem becomes undecidable.

Abstract. We consider the control problem for timed automata against specifications given as MTL formulas. The logic MTL is a linear-time timed temporal logic which extends LTL with timing constraints on modalities, and recently, its model-checking has been proved decidable in several cases. We investigate these decidable fragments of MTL (full MTL when interpreted over finite timed words, and Safety-MTL when interpreted over infinite timed words), and prove two kinds of results. (1) We first prove that, contrary to model-checking, the control problem is undecidable. Roughly, the computation of a lossy channel system could be encoded as a model-checking problem, and we prove here that a perfect channel system can be encoded as a control problem. (2) We then prove that if we fix the resources of the controller (by resources we mean clocks and constants that the controller can use), the control problem becomes decidable. This decidability result relies on properties of well (and better) quasi-orderings. 1

Abstract. We consider concurrent two-player timed automaton games with ω-regular objectives specified as parity conditions. These games offer an appropriate model for the synthesis of real-time controllers. Earlier works on timed games focused on pure strategies for each player. We study, for the first time, the use of randomized strategies in such games. While pure (i.e., nonrandomized) strategies in timed games require infinite memory for winning even with respect to reachability objectives, we show that randomized strategies can win with finite memory with respect to all parity objectives. Also, the synthesized randomized realtime controllers are much simpler in structure than the corresponding pure controllers, and therefore easier to implement. For safety objectives we prove the existence of pure finite-memory winning strategies. Finally, while randomization helps in simplifying the strategies required for winning timed parity games, we prove that randomization does not help in winning at more states. 1

... In this paper we focus on the verification of open real-time systems, modeled as nondeterministic timed automata [2]: finite automata augmented with a finite set of real-valued clocks. The transitions of a timed automaton are enabled according to the current state, that is, the current location and the current clock values. In a transition, clocks can be instantaneously reset. The value of a clock is exactly the time elapsed since the last time it was reset. A clock constraint (guard) is associated to each transition with the meaning that a transition can be taken only if the associated guard is enabled. A clock constraint (invariant) can also be associated to each location with the meaning that the automaton can stay in a location as long as the corresponding invariant remains true. When

Abstract. We consider two-player games played in real time on game structures with clocks and parity objectives. The games are concurrent in that at each turn, both players independently propose a time delay and an action, and the action with the shorter delay is chosen. To prevent a player from winning by blocking time, we restrict each player to strategies that ensure that the player cannot be responsible for causing a zeno run. First, we present an efficient reduction of these games to turn-based (i.e., nonconcurrent) finite-state (i.e., untimed) parity games. The states of the resulting game are pairs of clock regions of the original game. Our reduction improves the best known complexity for solving timed parity games. Moreover, the rich class of algorithms for classical parity games can now be applied to timed parity games. Second, we consider two restricted classes of strategies for the player that represents the controller in a real-time synthesis problem, namely, limitrobust and bounded-robust strategies. Using a limit-robust strategy, the controller cannot choose an exact real-valued time delay but must allow for some nonzero jitter in each of its actions. If there is a given lower bound on the jitter, then the strategy is bounded-robust. We show that exact strategies are more powerful than limit-robust strategies, which are more powerful than bounded-robust strategies for any bound. For both kinds of robust strategies, we present efficient reductions to standard timed automaton games. These reductions provide algorithms for the synthesis of robust real-time controllers. 1