Beyond the PDP-11
Abstract
We propose a new memory-safe interpretation of the C abstract machine that provides stronger protection to benefit security and debugging. Despite ambiguities in the specification intended to provide implementation flexibility, contemporary implementations of C have converged on a memory model similar to the PDP-11, the original target for C. This model lacks support for memory safety despite well-documented impacts on security and reliability.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Pub Defense Publication
- Publication Date
- Mar 14, 2015
- Source ID
- 10.1145/2786763.2694367
Entities
People
- Brooks Davis
- Colin Rothwell
- David Chisnall
- Jonathan Woodruff
- Michael Roe
- Munraj Vadera
- Peter G. Neumann
- Robert N.m. Watson
- Simon W. Moore
Organizations
- Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency
- SRI International
- University of Cambridge