[TYPES/announce] FME Teaching Tutorial on January 26, 2024, 3pm CEST: Prof Alcino Cunha, University of Minho, Portugal: Teaching Alloy with Alloy4Fun

[Luigia Petre]

Dear all,

The Formal Methods Teaching tutorials series starts in 2024 with a lecture on Friday, January 26!

Prof Alcino Cunha, University of Minho, Portugal will lecture on his experiences in teaching Alloy with Alloy4Fun on Friday, January 26, 2024 at 3 pm CEST. Alcino uses Alloy4Fun in teaching since 2019, and was one of the proponents of Alloy6 and Alloy4Fun. Here is a bit of context for Alloy4Fun, from https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://haslab.github.io/Alloy4Fun/tutorial.html__;!!IBzWLUs!QG0TbtJPODko51XMrtCNyPKJJPhN6dRRenFA59JyEYQAMOhrdONVVXpiAie0YsKvtFaafA82_L4OVb1y0r0A8LglEuqOdK7cUtC8$ :

"Due to the simplicity and flexibility of the language and intuitive and automatic feedback provided by its analyzer, Alloy is often taught in introductory formal methods courses. However, the classic standalone Alloy Analyzer suffers from some limitations that hinder its usage in the classroom, namely

  *    the lack of a straightforward mechanism to share simple Alloy models, instances and associated themes, a process that becomes cumbersome in large classes where students require feedback or have to submit exercise resolutions for evaluation; and
  *    the absence of some automated assessment functionality or online judge system for students to autonomously solve exercises and receive automatic feedback regarding the correctness of their resolutions.

The Alloy4Fun platform was developed precisely to address these issues. Alloy4Fun allows users to edit and execute Alloy 6 models online, providing a minimalistic customizable instance visualizer. Both models and instances can be easily shared through permalinks. Moreover, the platform provides support for simple specification challenges in the form of duels where students attempt to discover a secret constraint specified by the instructors. When solving these challenges, students are supported by a hint system to nudge them in the right direction when stuck. Alloy4Fun collects anonymized information about the student submissions and interactions, so that instructors can measure the progress of the students on the shared challenges and identify potential learning bottlenecks."

More information about our lecturer can be found here: https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://alcinocunha.github.io/__;!!IBzWLUs!QG0TbtJPODko51XMrtCNyPKJJPhN6dRRenFA59JyEYQAMOhrdONVVXpiAie0YsKvtFaafA82_L4OVb1y0r0A8LglEuqOdHUPh61W$ .

The zoom link for Alcino's lecture is https://aboakademi.zoom.us/j/64254430116.

The event will last about an hour.

Warmly welcome!!

Best wishes,
Luigia

PS: for more info, here is the tutorial series webpage:
https://urldefense.com/v3/__https://fme-teaching.github.io/2021/08/24/tutorial-series-of-the-fme-teaching-committee/__;!!IBzWLUs!QG0TbtJPODko51XMrtCNyPKJJPhN6dRRenFA59JyEYQAMOhrdONVVXpiAie0YsKvtFaafA82_L4OVb1y0r0A8LglEuqOdP-t_X1N$ .



__
Luigia Petre, Docent, PhD
Faculty of Science and Engineering
Åbo Akademi University, Finland
https://urldefense.com/v3/__http://www.users.abo.fi/lpetre__;!!IBzWLUs!QG0TbtJPODko51XMrtCNyPKJJPhN6dRRenFA59JyEYQAMOhrdONVVXpiAie0YsKvtFaafA82_L4OVb1y0r0A8LglEuqOdP7rlwWZ$ 
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