Maximal and minimal dynamic Petri net slicing

Abstract

Context: Petri net slicing is a technique to reduce the size of a Petri net so that it can ease the analysis or understanding of the original Petri net.Objective: Presenting two new Petri net slicing algorithms to isolate those places and transitions of a Petri net (the slice) that may contribute tokens to one or more places given (the slicing criterion). Method:The two algorithms proposed are formalized. The completeness of the first algorithm and the minimality of the second algorithm are formally proven. Both algorithms together with other three state-of-the-art algorithms have been implemented and integrated into a single tool so that we have been able to carry out a fair empirical evaluation.Results: Besides the two new Petri net slicing algorithms, a public, free, and open-source implementation of five algorithms is reported. The results of an empirical evaluation of the new algorithms and the slices that they produce are also presented. Conclusions:The first algorithm collects all places and transitions that may influence (in any computation) the slicing criterion, while the second algorithm collects a minimum set of places and transitions that may influence (in some computation) the slicing criterion. Therefore, the net computed by the first algorithm can reproduce any computation that contributes tokens to any place of interest. In contrast, the second algorithm loses this possibility but it often produces a much more reduced subnet (which still can reproduce some computations that contribute tokens to some places of interest). The first algorithm is proven complete, and the second one is proven minimal.