Experience report

Hollingsworth, Joseph E.; Blankenship, Lori; Weide, Bruce W.

doi:10.1145/357474.355048

Cited by 4 publications

(1 citation statement)

References 13 publications

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“…This makes the difficulty in reasoning about large software systems grow at a far faster rate than their size (measured, say, in lines of code). Careful component design that hides pointers from clients can address this problem (Sitaraman and Weide, 1994;Weide, 1996;Hollingsworth et al, 2000).…”

Section: The Futurementioning

confidence: 99%

Component‐Based Systems

Weide

2002

Encyclopedia of Software Engineering

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Human‐engineered physical devices such as cars and appliances and computers, as well as naturally occurring physical objects such as forests and galaxies and nerve bundles, are often called “systems.” Both this word and the thinking that underlies it are crucial features of modern software engineering as well. Software systems, however, are purely symbolic entities that have meaning and intellectual interest even without a physical manifestation. Component‐based systems in physical engineering and in software engineering therefore have many common features, yet differ in important and sometimes subtle ways. The characteristics of component‐based software engineering as currently practiced can be approached from two different perspectives. One explanation is based on the relationship to fundamental principles of system design. In this view, the key features of component‐based software engineering could have developed simply as inevitable consequences of applying general “system thinking” to software systems. Another explanation is based on observing the history of two related branches of software engineering research. In this view, the key features of component‐based software engineering actually have resulted from a melding of the concurrent but curiously separate activities of two communities: advances in software reuse research and common off‐the‐shelf (COTS) component technology, and advances in object‐oriented (OO) technology. This article begins by exploring the fundamental similarities and differences between component‐based systems in the physical world and those in the software world. It then uses that analysis and a summary of component‐based software research as a basis for understanding the currently unfolding transition from second‐generation to third‐generation OO technology: the integration of component‐based software concepts into modern software practice, which relies on the identification and use of “objects”.

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Section: The Futurementioning

confidence: 99%

Component‐Based Systems

Weide

2002

Encyclopedia of Software Engineering

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Building a push-button RESOLVE verifier: Progress and challenges

et al. 2011

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A central objective of the verifying compiler grand challenge is to develop a push-button verifier that generates proofs of correctness in a syntax-driven fashion similar to the way an ordinary compiler generates machine code. The software developer’s role is then to provide suitable specifications and annotated code, but otherwise to have no direct involvement in the verification step. However, the general mathematical developments and results upon which software correctness is based may be established through a separate formal proof process in which proofs might be mechanically checked, but not necessarily automatically generated. While many ideas that could conceivably form the basis for software verification have been known “in principle” for decades, and several tools to support an aspect of verification have been devised, practical fully automated verification of full software behavior remains a grand challenge. This paper explains how RESOLVE takes a step towards addressing this challenge by integrating foundational and practical elements of software engineering, programming languages, and mathematical logic into a coherent framework. Current versions of the RESOLVE verifier generate verification conditions (VCs) for the correctness of component-based software in a modular fashion—one component at a time. The VCs are currently verified using automated capabilities of the Isabelle proof assistant, the SMT solver Z3, a minimalist rewrite prover, and some specialized decision procedures. Initial experiments with the tools and further analytic considerations show both the progress that has been made and the challenges that remain.

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