Supervisory Control for Software Runtime Exception Avoidance

The Supervisory Control Theory (SCT) introduced by Ramadge and Wonham offers a framework for the control of Discrete Event Systems. In this paper, we formalize some concepts about corrective software maintenance within this framework. More specifically, we consider SCT as a way to control software systems behaviors and avoid occurrences of runtime exceptions. This approach is attractive as algorithms for controllers synthesis offer a means to automate part of the corrective maintenance process. In this paper, we introduce problems related to removing observed software failures by control, as well as solutions.