Title :
Certifying the correctness of software
Author :
Mills, Harlan D.
Author_Institution :
Florida Inst. of Technol., Melbourne, FL, USA
Abstract :
Software is either correct or incorrect in design to a specification in contrast to hardware which is reliable to a certain level to a correct design. Software of any size or complexity can only be tested partially, and typically a very small fraction of possible inputs are actually tested. Certifying the correctness of such software requires two conditions, namely (1) statistical testing with inputs characteristic of actual usage, and (2) no failures in the testing. If any failures arise in testing or subsequent usage, the software is incorrect, and the certification invalid. If such failures are corrected, the certification process can be restarted, with no use of previous testing
Keywords :
formal specification; program testing; program verification; software reliability; certification process; cleanroom software engineering; correctness; software; specification; statistical testing; Agriculture; Certification; Computer errors; Computer industry; Hardware; Humans; Mathematics; Software engineering; Software testing; Statistics;
Conference_Titel :
System Sciences, 1992. Proceedings of the Twenty-Fifth Hawaii International Conference on
Conference_Location :
Kauai, HI
Print_ISBN :
0-8186-2420-5
DOI :
10.1109/HICSS.1992.183251
