Systematic program development

Author

Dromey, R. Geoff

Author_Institution

Dept. of Comput. Sci., Wollongong Univ., NSW, Australia

Volume

14

Issue

1

fYear

1988

fDate

1/1/1988 12:00:00 AM

Firstpage

12

Lastpage

29

Abstract

A constructive method of program development is presented. It is based on a simple strategy for problem decomposition that is claimed to be more supportive of goal-oriented programming than the Wirth-Dijkstra top-down refinement method. With the proposed method, a program is developed by making a sequence of refinements, each of which can establish the postcondition for a corresponding sequence of progressively weaker preconditions until a mechanism has been composed that will establish the postcondition for the original given precondition for the problem. The strategy can minimize case analysis, simplify constructive program proofs, and ensure a correspondence between program structure and data structure

Keywords

programming; software engineering; case analysis; constructive program proofs; data structure; goal-oriented programming; postcondition; problem decomposition; program development; program structure; refinements; Australia; Data structures; Formal specifications; Information technology; Partitioning algorithms; Pressing; Process design; Proposals;

fLanguage

English

Journal_Title

Software Engineering, IEEE Transactions on

Publisher

ieee

ISSN

0098-5589

Type

jour

DOI

10.1109/32.4619

Filename

4619