This memorial paper tells the story of the beginning of Boris (Boaz) Trakhtenbrot's long and rich life path, full of unusual and sometimes tragic events. This path led a boy from a Jewish settlement in Eastern Europe to be recognized as one of the founding fathers of theoretical computer science. Comment: Added a correct journal reference on the front page

In the mandatory undergraduate course on Theory of Computation, students get familiar with the limits of computation and learn to prove that certain languages are undecidable or even non-recognizable. For this purpose, Rice's theorem and reduction technique are used. The former is very general and highly abstract, so that students find it difficult to use it. The later is more tangible, but involves severe creative challenges related to the need of defining a close relationship between two different languages. We have identified a number of patterns that address a variety of typical reduction problems, and that help the students as a practical tool for solution of reduction exercises.

Course "Computability and Complexity" allows students to get familiar with limits of computation and degrees of algorithmic (decidable, enumerable, undecidable) and computational (P, NP, NP-complete) complexity of problems. Students learn to use reducibility techniques for analysis of language complexity. Due to the formal and abstract nature of the studied concepts, students tend to develop a variety of misconceptions that turn such analysis to a wrong path. In our research, we analysed typical misconceptions arising in this context and their sources. We then developed a series of special purpose examples that help students to actively construct a proper understanding by confronting their misconceptions.

No abstract available.

The area of embedded systems (ES) has been gaining momentum in recent years. Such systems are used in a wide spectrum of application areas in industry. According to experts, the demand for knowledgeable and skilled academicians in the area of ES engineering (ESE) is expected to continue to grow. This led to increasing recognition by the industry and the academy of the need in designated curricula for training graduates in ESE. This paper describes a distinctive program for a B. Sc. degree in ESE, developed at the CS Department of Holon Academic Institute of Technology (HAIT). The proposed program essentially differs from the programs in traditional computing disciplines: it is multi-disciplinary in its nature and is intended to provide a broad integrative knowledge in a wide spectrum of areas required for ES development: hardware, software, real time, control and signal processing, and technology management. The program combines teaching theoretical principles with exposure to advanced technologies in order to prepare the graduates for successful integration into high-tech projects of the modern industry

No abstract available.

Safety-critical reactive systems are characterized by a complex behavior, making their testing and debugging a very difficult task. Observed incorrect behavior might be hard to reproduce: even small changes in order or in time at which input events occur may have a significant impact on system reaction. The challenge is how to utilize (typically, partial) information about failed system run to reproduce and localize the problem. For statechart-based models of reactive systems, it is shown how testing and model checking can be combined to reproduce errors observed during execution of code generated from model. This approach is based on the use of State mate ModelChecker tool. The main idea is to use the available knowledge about "irreproducible" run that violates system property P, in order to properly set up verification for reachability of not P. A realistic rail cross control example is used to illustrate the approach.

No abstract available.

STATEMATE is a set of tools, with a heavy graphical orientation, intended for the specification, analysis, design, and documentation of large and complex reactive systems. It enables a user to prepare, analyze, and debug diagrammatic, yet precise, descriptions of the system under development from three interrelated points of view, capturing structure, functionality, and behavior. These views are represented by three graphical languages, the most intricate of which is the language of statecharts, used to depict reactive behavior over time. In addition to the use of statecharts, the main novelty of STATEMATE is in the fact that it understands the entire descriptions perfectly, to the point of being able to analyze them for crucial dynamic properties, to carry out rigorous executions and simulations of the described system, and to create running code automatically. These features are invaluable when it comes to the quality and reliability of the final outcome.>