A visual programming environment for Z specifications

The existing Z supporting tools focus on providing editing and syntax checking functionalities (Siddiqi et al., 1993). We develop VZ (Visual Z) visual programming environment for constructing Z specifications. The main advantage of such an environment is to allow the user to manipulate icons (glyphs) to generate a specification. Instead of remembering the set of Z symbols, the user can manipulate the visually understandable icons to develop the specification. Moreover, VZ is a well organized environment; various components of a specification are organized into different folders for easy storage and retrieval. Finally, VZ also supports validation of specification and basic logic proving, which are essential in developing correct specification