Sven Keidel

Office: Hochschulstr. 10, 64289 Darmstadt, Germany

I am a computer science researcher, mathematician, and musician. I work as a postdoctoral researcher in the software technology group at TU Darmstadt in Germany. Prior to that, I worked as a PhD student at JGU Mainz under supervision of Prof. Sebastian Erdweg.

In my research, I develop techniques that simplify the design and implementation of static analyses. Static analyses are tools that provide information about programs by inspecting the source code without running them. They are used in integrated development environments, continuous integration servers, and compilers. A challenge in the design of such static analyses is to ensure that the analysis results are reliable (sound). However, rigorously proving that a static analysis is sound, is a difficult and laborious task. To this end, I develop techniques that simplify the development and soundness proof of static analyses. The core principle is to develop analyses from modular and reusable building blocks, such that the soundness proof becomes compositional.

Besides my main area of research, my research interests are proof techniques, category theory, type and effect systems. In my spare time I explore the vineyards of Mainz by bike and enjoy the nature. When I am at home, I like to play piano and bake delicious artisan sourdough bread.

Qualifications

Doctoral Degree in Computer Science

Johannes Gutenberg-Universität, Germany
Thesis: Modular Specification and Compositional Soundness of Abstract Interpreters
Advisor: Sebastian Erdweg
Grade: Summa Cum Laude
2021

Master of Science in Computer Science

Technische Universität Darmstadt, Germany
Thesis: A Disintegrated Development Environment
Advisor: Sebastian Erdweg
Grade: 1.82
2015

Bachelor of Science in Computer Science

Technische Universität Darmstadt, Germany
Thesis: Code Completion for JavaScript with N-Grams
Advisor: Sebastian Procksch
Grade: 2.20
2013

Publications

A Modular Soundness Theory for the Blackboard Analysis Architecture

Sven Keidel, Dominik Helm, Tobias Roth, Mira Mizini
European Symposium on Programming (ESOP), Programming Languages and Systems, Springer.
2024

Unimocg: Modular Call-Graph Algorithms for Consistent Handling of Language Features

Dominik Helm, Tobias Roth, Sven Keidel, Michael Reif, Mira Mizini
International Symposium on Software Testing (ISSTA), Proceedings of the ACM SIGSOFT, ACM.
2024

Total Recall? How Good are Static Call Graphs Really?

Dominik Helm, Sven Keidel, Anemone Kampkötter, Johannes Düsing, Tobias Roth, Ben Hermann, Mira Mizini
International Symposium on Software Testing (ISSTA), Proceedings of the ACM SIGSOFT, ACM.
2024

Combinator-Based Fixpoint Algorithms for Big-Step Abstract Interpreters

Sven Keidel, Sebastian Erdweg, Tobias Hombücher
International Conference on Functional Programming (ICFP), Proc. ACM Program. Lang., ACM.
2023

Modular Abstract Definitional Interpreters for WebAssembly

Katharina Brandl, Sebastian Erdweg, Sven Keidel, Nils Hansen
European Conference on Object-Oriented Programming (ECOOP), Leibniz International Proceedings in Informatics, Schloss Dagstuhl -- Leibniz-Zentrum für Informatik.
2023

Modular Specification and Compositional Soundness of Abstract Interpreters

Sven Keidel
Johannes Gutenberg Universität (JGU Mainz), PhD Dissertation, Mathematik u. Informatik.
2021

A Systematic Approach to Abstract Interpretation of Program Transformations

Sven Keidel, Sebastian Erdweg
Verification, Model Checking, and Abstract Interpretation (VMCAI), Lecture Notes in Computer Science, Springer.
2020

Sound and Reusable Components for Abstract Interpretation

Sven Keidel, Sebastian Erdweg
Object-Oriented Programming, Systems, Languages, and Applications (OOPSLA), Proc. ACM Program. Lang., ACM.
2019

Compositional Soundness Proofs of Abstract Interpreters

Sven Keidel, Casper Bach Poulsen, Sebastian Erdweg
International Conference on Functional Programming (ICFP), Proc. ACM Program. Lang., ACM.
2018

Toward Abstract Interpretation of Program Transformations

Sven Keidel, Sebastian Erdweg
Workshop on Meta-Programming Techniques and Reflection (META), Proceedings of the ACM SIGPLAN, ACM.
2017

The IDE Portability Problem and its Solution in Monto

Sven Keidel, Wulf Pfeiffer, Sebastian Erdweg
Software Language Engineering (SLE), Proceedings of the ACM SIGPLAN, ACM.
2016


Teaching

Lecturer and Organizer
Teaching Assistance

Supervision

PhD Students
Bachelor and Master Students

Funding

Cross-Language Library-Aware Security Analysis of Complex Software Systems

Principal Investiagor: Mira Mizini, Coauthor: Sven Keidel
National Research Center for Applied Cybersecurity (ATHENE)
2022

Correct, Efficient, and Flexible Fixpoint Algorithms for Big-Step Abstract Interpreters

Principal Investiagor: Sebastian Erdweg, Coauthor: Sven Keidel
Deutsche Forschungs Gesellschaft (DFG)
2022

Awards