Abstract
Research into the industrial application of formal methods has concentrated almost exclusively on the specification of software systems in high-risk or safety critical applications Thus, attention has been directed to technical problems with technical systems.
In this paper we justify and report early results from a research project which aims to evaluate the implications of using the formal specification language Object-Z as an analytic tool in an Information Systems environment.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Anon.Information systems research methods—summary of a questionnaire investigation carried out by IFIP WG 8.2 TG. Information Age, 9(4): 238–241, October 1987.
D.E. Avison and G. Fitzgerald. Information Systems Development: Methodologies, Techniques and Tools, Blackwell Scientific Publications, Oxford, 1988.
N. D. Birrell and M. A. Ould. A Practical Handbook for Software Development Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1985.
J.J. Bloombecker. Malpractice in IS? Datamation, pages 85–86, Oct 15 1989.
R.E. Bloomfield and P.K.D. Froome. The application of formal methods to the assessment of high integrity software. IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, SE-12(9): 988–993, September 1986.
B. W. Boehm. Software engineering. IEEE Transactions on Computers, C-25(12): 1226–1241, December 1976.
R.J. Boland and R.A. Hirschheim. Critical Issues in Information Systems Research. Wiley, Chichester, 1987.
R.A. Buckingham, R.A. Hirschheim, Frank F. Land, and Colin J. Tully, editors. Information Systems Education: Recommendations and Implementation. Cambridge University Press., Cambridge, 1987.
P.B. Checkland. Systems Thinking, Systems Practice. Wiley, Chichester, 1981.
Peter Checkland and Jim Scholes. Soft Systems Methodology in Practice. Wiley, Chichester, 1990.
B. Cohen, W.T. Harwood, and M.I. Jackson. Specification of Complex Systems. Addison Wesley, Wokingham, 1986.
R.J. Cunningham, A. Finkelstein, S. Goldsack, T. Maibaum, and C. Potts. Formal requirements specification—the Forest project. In Proceedings of the International Workshop on Software Specification and Design, pages 186–191, London, August 1985.
J. Dearden. The withering away of the IS organisation. Sloan Management Review, pages 87–91, Summer 1987.
Tom DeMarco. Structured Analysis and System Specification. Yourdon Press, New York, 1978.
R. Duke, P. King, G. Rose, and G. Smith. The Object-Z specification language: Version 1. Technical Report 91-1, Software Verification Research Centre, Dept. of Computer Science, Univ. of Queensland, Australia, 1991.
A.L. Eliason. Systems Development: Analysis, Design, and Implementation. Scott, Foresman/Little, Brown Higher Education, Glenview, Illinois, 2nd edition, 1990.
R.D. Galliers, editor. Information Analysis: Selected Readings. Addison Wesley, Sydney, Australia, 1987.
Anthony Hall. Seven myths of formal methods. IEEE Software, 7(5): 11–19, September 1990.
I. Hayes, editor. Specification Case Studies. Prentice Hall International (UK), London, 1987.
Ian Hayes. Applying formal specification to software development in industry. IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, SE-11(2): 169–178, February 1985.
Darryl C. Ince. A standard for formal education. Computing (UK), May 25 1989.
G.W. Jones. Software Engineering. John Wiley and Sons, New York, 1990.
P. Keen. MIS Research: Reference Disciplines and a Cummulative Tradition, pages 1–13. In Buckingham et al. [8], 1987.
P.G.W. Keen. MIS research: Reference disciplines and a cumulative tradition. In Proceedings of the 1st International Conference on Information Systems, Philadelphia, PA, 8–10 December 1980.
A. Macro. Software Engineering: Concepts and Management. Prentice Hall International (UK) Ltd, Hemel Hempstead, Herts, 1990.
A. Macro and J.N. Buxton. The Craft of Software Engineering. Addison Wesley, Reading, 1987.
H.E. McKenzie Sibbitt. Software quality: A formal introduction to def stan. Systems International, April 1989.
C.C. Morgan and B.A. Sufrin. Specification of the UNIX filing system. IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering, SE-10(2): 128–142, February 1984.
E. Mumford, R. Hirschheim, G. Fitzgerald, and A.T. Wood-Harper, editors. Research Methods in Information Systems. Elsevier Science Publishers B.V., Amsterdam, 1985.
M. Norris. Z: A formal specification method. Starts: Software tools for application to large real-time systems: Debrief report, National Computing Centre Ltd, Manchester, 1986.
J.F. Nunamaker. Educational programs in information systems: A report of the ACM Curriculum Committee on Information Systems. Communications of the ACM, 24(3): 124–133, March 1981.
B.W. Oakley. The Alvey programme: Progress report—1985 (poster supplement). Technical report, Alvey Directorate, 1985.
T.W. Olle, J. Hagelstein, LG. Macdonald, C. Roland, H.G. Sol, F.J.M. Van Assche, and A.A. Verrijn-Stuart. Information Systems Methodologies: A Framework for Understanding. Addison Wesley, Wokingham, 1988.
Meilir Page-Jones. The Practical Guide to Structured Systems Design. Yourdon Press, New York, 2nd edition, 1988.
B. Ratcliff. Software Engineering: Priciples and Methods. Blackwell Scientific Publications, Oxford, 1987.
J.A. Senn. Information Systems in Management. Wadsworth Publishing Co., Belmont, California, 4th edition, 1990.
Mary Shaw. Prospects for an enineering discipline of software. IEEE Software, 7(6): 15–24, November 1990.
Ian Sommerville. Software Engineering. Addison Wesley, Wokingham, third edition, 1989.
D.V. Steward. Software Engineering with Systems Analysis and Design. Brooks/Cole Publishing Co., Monteray, California, 1987.
G.I. Susman and R.D. Evered. An assessment of the scientific merit of action research. Administrative Science Quarterly, 23: 582–603, 1978.
P.A. Swatman and P.M.C. Swatman. The software reusability issue: Perspectives from software engineering and information systems. In Proceedings of the 1st Australian Conference on Information Systems, February 1990.
P.A. Swatman and P.M.C. Swatman. Formal specification: An analytic tool for (management) information systems. Journal of Information Systems, 2(2), April 1992. forthcoming.
P.A. Swatman, P.M.C. Swatman, and R. Duke. Electronic Data Interchange: A high-level formal specification in Object-Z. In P.A. Bailes, editor, 6th Australian Software Engineering Conference (ASWEC’91): Engineering Safe Software, Sydney, NSW, 1991.
P.A. Swatman, P.M.C. Swatman, and J.E. Everett. Stages of growth of an innovative software house: An additional criterion for software package selection. Australian Computer Journal, 22(3): 81–91, August 1990.
Ludwig von Bertalanffy. The theory of open systems in physics and biology. Science, 3: 23–29, 1950.
Brian Wilson. Systems: Concepts, Methodologies and Applications. Wiley, Chichester, 2nd edition, 1990.
J. Wordsworth. Teaching formal specification methods in an industrial environment. In Software Engineering 86, pages 43–51. Peter Perigrinus, London, 1986.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1992 British Computer Society
About this paper
Cite this paper
Swatman, P.A., Fowler, D., Gan, C.Y.M. (1992). Extending the Useful Application Domain for Formal Methods. In: Nicholls, J.E. (eds) Z User Workshop, York 1991. Workshops in Computing. Springer, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4471-3203-5_6
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4471-3203-5_6
Publisher Name: Springer, London
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-19780-5
Online ISBN: 978-1-4471-3203-5
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive