Beyond isolation: OS verification as a foundation for correct applications

Verified systems software has generally had to assume the correctness of the operating system and its provided services ( like networking and the file system). Even though there exist verified operating systems and file systems, the specifications for these components do not compose with applications to produce a fully verified high-performance software stack. In this position paper, we lay out our vision for what it would look like to have a verified OS with verified applications, all with good multi-core performance. We've explored a part of the verification by proving a page table correct already, but the larger goal is to lay out a vision for an ambitious project that supports an application verified from its high-level specification down to the hardware.