Defining process fairness for non-interleaving concurrency

Abstract

Process fairness properties are semantically characterized in a non-interleaving model for concurrency, which allows a causality-based representation of finite and infinite concurrent behaviours. The model has been extended with additional structure so that process fairness can be defined. A variety of decompositions of the system into concurrent sub-processes, partially ordered by a refinement relation, have been derived. Each such decomposition gives rise to a class of process fairness properties. The hierarchies of process fairness properties are also discussed.