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A formal software development approach using refinement calculus

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Abstract

The advantage of COOZ (Complete Object-Oriented Z) is to specify large scale software, but it does not support refinement calculus. Thus its application is confined for software development. Including refinement calculus into COOZ overcomes its disadvantage during design and implementation. The separation between the design and implementation for structure and notation is removed as well. The the software can be developed smoothly in the same frame. The combination of COOZ and refinement calculus can build object-oriented frame, in which the specification in COOZ is refined stepwise to code by calculus. In this paper, the development model is established, which is based on COOZ and refinement calculus. Data refinement is harder to deal with in a refinement tool than ordinary algorithmic refinement, since data refinement usually has to be done on a large program component at once. As to the implementation technology of refinement calculus, the data refinement calculator is constructed and an approach for data refinement which is based on data refinement calculus and program window inference is offered.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory for Novel Software Technology, Nanjing University, 210093, Nanjing, P.R. China

    Wang Yunfeng, Pang Jun, Zha Ming, Zhaohui Yang & Zheng Guoliang

  2. Meteorology College, PLA University of Science and Technology, 211101, Nanjing, P.R. China

    Wang Yunfeng

Authors
  1. Wang Yunfeng
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  2. Pang Jun
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  3. Zha Ming
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  4. Zhaohui Yang
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  5. Zheng Guoliang
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Additional information

The work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No.69673006) and the National Ninth Five-Year Project (98-780-01-07-06) of China.

WANG Yunfeng received his Ph.D. degree from Department of Computer Science and Technology, Nanjing UIniversity in 2000. He is now working in Meteorology College, PLA University of Science and Technology. His research interests include formal methods and object-oriented technology.

PANG Jun received his M.S. degree from Department of Computer Science and Technology, Nanjing University in 2000. He is now a Ph.D. candidate in Department of Software Engineering, National Center for Mathematics and Computer Science (CWI), Netherlands. His interests include process algebra, protocol verification, Z & refinement calculus and object-oriented technology.

YANG Zhaohui received his B.S. degree from Department of Computer Science and Technology at Nanjing University in 2000. He is now an M.S. candidate of Department of Computer Science and Technology, Nanjing University.

ZHENG Guoliang is a professor in Department of Computer Science and Technology, Nanjing University. He received his B.S. degree in computer science from Nanjing University in 1961. His main research area is software engineering.

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Wang, Y., Pang, J., Zha, M. et al. A formal software development approach using refinement calculus. J. Comput. Sci. & Technol. 16, 251–262 (2001). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02943203

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02943203

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