An overview of the saturn project

Abstract

We present an overview of the Saturn program analysis system, including a rationale for three major design decisions: the use of function-at-a-time, or summary-based, analysis, the use of constraints, and the use of a logic programming language to express program analysis algorithms. We argue that the combination of summaries and constraints allows Saturn to achieve both great scalability and great precision, while the use of a logic programming language with constraints allows for succinct, high-level expression of program analyses.