Welcome to Orcmid's Lair, the playground for family connections, pastimes, and scholarly vocation -- the collected professional and recreational work of Dennis E. Hamilton

 
[FOM] Reply on Tony Hoare and Software Mathematics Economics.  [thrownback from 2004-05-06-0851 -0700] After my little note, Steven posted a response in support of the work of Tony Hoare.  Let me be clear:  I have nothing but admiration for Hoare's work, the formalization of Concurrent Sequential Processes, and all of the work that flows therefrom, including Z.

I reiterate that this is valuable work, it is not the same as saying successful software development requires it (as a generality), and it will not always be applicable (i.e., in confirming non-formalized qualities and the validity of formalized ones).  I don't expect to find a silver bullet.  And the work should be continued, so that its standing as an useful bullet can be understood and delimited.  In practice, computer science is an empirical science, I say, and we definitely do need to understand that better and also comprehend where solid theories apply.

Steven also asserts that "it is only a matter of economics that lets software companies get away with the liberal informality of modern programming languages." He speaks of bugs as an externality the cost of which is passed on to customers, concluding that "computer programmers are not mathematicians is matter only of economic tolerance and engineering pragmatics." I do not know how to eliminate engineering pragmatics and (mere?) economic considerations. I have nothing to contribute along those axes.

I do cling to a middle-ground view that is perhaps allied with the "middle road" perspective of David Parnas. I think verification tools are important, I don't think they can ever be all of it, and there is far more to software engineering than verification to specifications, however and to whatever degree it is carried out.
posted by Dennis at 5/4/2004 01:15:48 PM