mlsanityData to 14 Oct 2026

From Reading Code to Reading Spec: A Verified Layer for LLM-Driven Codebase Maintenance

arXiv 2609.06383 ↗First posted 6 Sep 2026cs.SE cs.CLcited by 0

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Abstract (arXiv)

The rapid growth of LLM-generated code increases software complexity and the maintenance burden on engineers. While LLMs offer a potential automated alternative, this structural complexity hinders their ability to manage codebases directly. We introduce the Provable Representation Of Original Functionality (PROOF), which manages codebases indirectly via structured specifications. To enable full-lifecycle codebase management strictly through these specifications, PROOF abstracts codebase topology into a hierarchical natural-language representation. To establish absolute trust, the system proves semantic equivalence by reconstructing source code exclusively from this specification. This verified foundation drives maintenance requests, executing code modifications while synchronously updating itself to prevent semantic drift. Experiments on real-world repositories confirm the effectiveness of these specifications.

Key facts. No citing papers in the map yet (data through 14 Oct 2026). Builds on 10 of its 21 references that are in the map. First posted on arXiv 6 Sep 2026.

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References · 10

  1. 2023Lost in the Middle: How Language Models Use Long Contextscited by 3,455
  2. 2023SWE-bench: Can Language Models Resolve Real-World GitHub Issues?cited by 3,373
  3. 2023RepoBench: Benchmarking Repository-Level Code Auto-Completion Systemscited by 353
  4. 2024RepoGraph: Enhancing AI Software Engineering with Repository-level Code Graphcited by 91
  5. 2025LocAgent: Graph-Guided LLM Agents for Code Localizationcited by 86
  6. 2024RepoAgent: An LLM-Powered Open-Source Framework for Repository-level Code Documentation Generationcited by 70
  7. 2024SimRAG: Self-Improving Retrieval-Augmented Generation for Adapting Large Language Models to Specialized Domainscited by 28
  8. 2025Issue Localization via LLM-Driven Iterative Code Graph Searchingcited by 22
  9. 2024Natural Language Outlines for Code: Literate Programming in the LLM Eracited by 9
  10. 2026Specification-Based Code-Text-Code Reengineering for LLM-Mediated Software Evolutioncited by 5

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