It's the Specification, Stupid!

In this article the authors challenge the current state of the test-fix-test coding cycles for software development and propose formal verification. The consideration of specification in formal verification is discussed as well as timing of verification. Topics include big specifications and front-l...

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Published in:Communications of the ACM Vol. 68; no. 12; pp. 22 - 25
Main Authors: Broy, Manfred, Ruess, Harald, Shankar, Natarajan
Format: Article
Published: Association for Computing Machinery Dec2025
Subjects:
Online Access:View this record in EBSCOhost
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      dt: Dec2025
      vid: 68
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        atl: It's the Specification, Stupid!
      aug:
        au:
          Broy, Manfred
          Ruess, Harald
          Shankar, Natarajan
        affil:
          Technische Universität München, Institut für Informatik, Garching b. München, Bavaria, Germany
          SRI International, Computer Science Laboratory, Menlo Park, CA, USA
          Entalus, Sarasota, FL, United States
          SRI, Computer Science Laboratory, Menlo Park, California, United States
      su:
        Computer software development
        Computer software quality control
        Software verification
        Language models
        Programming languages
      sug:
        subj:
          Computer software development
          Computer software quality control
          Software verification
          Language models
          Programming languages
      ab: In this article the authors challenge the current state of the test-fix-test coding cycles for software development and propose formal verification. The consideration of specification in formal verification is discussed as well as timing of verification. Topics include big specifications and front-loading as well as the role of large language models in this process.
      pubtype: Periodical
      doctype: Article
      src: R
    language: English
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