Superposition with Datatypes and Codatatypes

International audienceThe absence of a finite axiomatization of the first-order theory of data-types and codatatypes represents a challenge for automatic theorem provers. We propose two approaches to reason by saturation in this theory: one is a conservative theory extension with a finite number of axioms; the other is an extension of the superposition calculus, in conjunction with axioms. Both techniques are refutationally complete with respect to nonstandard models of datatypes and non-branching codatatypes. They take into account the acyclicity of datatype values and the existence and uniqueness of cyclic codatatype values. We implemented them in the first-order prover Vampire and compare them experimentally