mwang@watmath.UUCP (mwang) (05/08/84)
_D_E_P_A_R_T_M_E_N_T _O_F _C_O_M_P_U_T_E_R _S_C_I_E_N_C_E _U_N_I_V_E_R_S_I_T_Y _O_F _W_A_T_E_R_L_O_O _C_O_M_P_U_T_E_R _S_C_I_E_N_C_E _C_O_L_L_O_Q_U_I_U_M - Wednesday, May 16, 1984. Mr. P. Bassett of Netron Inc., Toronto, will speak on ``Design Principles for Software Manufacturing Tools.'' TIME: 3:30 PM ROOM: MC 5158 ABSTRACT A good solution to the reusable code problem turns out to provide a solid technical basis from which to under- stand and deal with the production, quality, and maintenance issues currently besieging the software in- dustry. To this end, a software manufacturing metho- dology has been developed called Computer Aided Pro- gramming sup tm . CAP is based on a functional pro- gramming concept called a frame, motivated in turn by the reusable code problem. The introduction explains the necessary background ideas about frames. Section two analyzes the subtle but important distinction between problem solving and programming. CAP design principles are then developed which show how to build software tools that support problem solving through open-ended, structured, program manufacturing techniques. The principles are organized around the flow of program specifications from `under' to `optimally,' to `over' specified, machine executable instructions. The components of an existing CAP system are described in section three, and section four discusses the usage of CAP as a manufacturing technique. Statistics from a case study are presented which indicate that: (a) pro- duction quality commercial software can be manufactured at rates exceeding 2000 lines of debugged COBOL per man-day (including systems design time), and (b) less than 10% of this code needs to be hand written/maintained. May 8, 1984 - 2 - Coffee and refreshments will be served at 3:00 PM. May 8, 1984