JNI Light: An Operational Model for the Core JNI

Abstract. Through foreign function interfaces (FFIs), software components in different programming languages interact with each other in the same address space. Recent years have witnessed a number of systems that analyze FFIs for safety and reliability. However, lack of formal specifications of FFIs hampers progress in this endeavor. We present a formal operational model, JNI Light (JNIL), for a subset of a widely used FFI--the Java Native Interface (JNI). JNIL focuses on the core issues when a high-level garbage-collected language interacts with a low-level language. It proposes abstractions for handling a shared heap, crosslanguage method calls, cross-language exception handling, and garbage collection. JNIL can directly serve as a formal basis for JNI tools and The abstractions in JNIL are also useful when modeling other FFIs, such as the Python/C interface and the OCaml/C interface. 1 Motivation Most modern programming languages support foreign function interfaces (FFIs) for inter...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2010
• Where: APLAS
• Authors: Gang Tan
• Keywords: APLAS 2010, Foreign Function, Formal Operational Model, Java Native Interface, Programming Languages