PhD Thesis. Detecting Relaxed Memory Concurrency Bugs in C and C++ Compilers @ University College London 2026

PhD Thesis. Detecting Relaxed Memory Concurrency Bugs in C and C++ Compilers @ University College London 2026 | LukeGeeson

I successfully defended my PhD thesis titled Detecting Relaxed Memory Concurrency Bugs in C and C++ Compilers. Thanks to Peter Sewell and David Clark for assessing the thesis!

The thesis is here.

The thesis is published by UCL and is available here and has a DOI 10.14324/000.th.10224678.

BibTeX:

Abstract is:

This thesis develops an automated testing framework and new testing techniques for discovering concurrency-related bugs in C and C++ compilers. Firstly, we present a technique that compares source and compiled program behaviours using source and architecture models. The Téléchat tool implements this technique and has found a number of new concurrency bugs. Secondly, we present the Mix testing technique, that tests the interoperability of compiler mappings. The Atomic-mixer tool implements mix testing, has found a number of new mixing bugs, and has been used to develop an Atomics Application Binary interface with Arm’s engineers. Lastly, we deploy Téléchat in automated testing, exposing the limits of current tools and models whilst exploring the state of concurrency compilation correctness in the LLVM and GCC compiler toolchains.

The People involved are:

Luke Geeson, UCL

Peter Sewell, University of Cambridge, Assessor

David Clark, UCL, Assessor

James Brotherston, UCL, PhD Supervisor

Earl Barr, UCL, Secondary PhD Supervisor

Lee Smith, Arm (now retired), Industry Supervisor

Feel free to email me if you have any questions using [email protected]