Structured Analysis: Beginnings of a New Discipline

Abstract

When I arrived at Bell Telephone Laboratories in the fall of 1963,1 was immediately assigned to the ESS-1 project. This was a hardware/software endeavor to develop the world’s first commercial stored program telephone switch (now installed in telephone offices all over the world). At the time, the project was made up of some 600 persons, divided about half-and-half between hardware and software. There was also a small simulation group (perhaps a dozen people) working to create an early prediction of system performance and robustness.