Generative transformations and patterns in LLM-native approaches for software verification and falsification

The emergence of prompting as the dominant paradigm for leveraging Large Language Models (LLMs) has led to a proliferation of LLM-native software, where application behavior arises from complex, stochastic data transformations. However, the engineering of such systems remains largely exploratory and ad-hoc, hampered by the absence of conceptual frameworks, ex-ante methodologies, design guidelines, and specialized benchmarks. We argue that a foundational step towards a more disciplined engineering practice is a systematic understanding of the core functional units–generative transformations–and their compositional patterns within LLM-native applications. Focusing on the rich domain of software verification and falsification, we conduct a secondary study of over 100 research proposals to address this gap. We first present a fine-grained taxonomy of generative transformations, abstracting prompt-based interactions into conceptual signatures. This taxonomy serves as a scaffolding to identify recurrent transformation relationship patterns–analogous to software design patterns–that characterize solution approaches in the literature. Our analysis not only validates the utility of the taxonomy but also surfaces strategic gaps and cross-dimensional relationships, offering a structured foundation for future research in modular and compositional LLM application design, benchmarking, and the development of reliable LLM-native systems.