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WORLDCOMP'11 Featured Keynote Lecture - Prof. David Lorge Parnas
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How Engineering Mathematics can Improve Software
Prof. David Lorge Parnas, Ph.D. Dr.h.c.: ETH Zurich, Louvain, Lugano Organization: Middle Road Software, Inc. Professor Emeritus, McMaster University, Canada Professor Emeritus, University of Limerick, Ireland Fellow of IEEE, ACM, RSC, CAE, GI; MRIA. www.sigsoft.org/SEN/parnas.html en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Parnas  Download Slide Presentation for This KeynoteDate: July 18, 2011 Time: 08:50 - 09:45am Location: The Monte Carlo Theater |
For many decades we have been promised that the "Formal Methods" developed by
computer scientists would bring about a drastic improvement in the quality and
cost of software development. That improvement has not materialized. We review
the reasons for this failure. We then explain the difference between the
notations that are used in formal methods and the mathematics that is essential
in other areas of Engineering. Finally, we illustrate the way that Engineering
Mathematics has proven useful in a variety of software projects.
Many of his papers have been found to have lasting value. For example, a paper written
25 years ago, based on a study of avionics software, was recently awarded a SIGSOFT
IMPACT award.
Parnas has won more than 20 awards for his contributions. In 2007, Parnas was proud to
share the IEEE Computer Societyʼs one-time sixtieth anniversary award with computer
pioneer Professor Maurice Wilkes of Cambridge University.
Parnas received his B.S., M.S. and Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering from Carnegie Mellon
University. and honorary doctorates from the ETH in Zurich (Switzerland), the Catholic
University of Louvain (Belgium), and the University of Italian Switzerland (Lugano). He is
licensed as a Professional Engineer in Ontario.
Parnas is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada (RSC), the Association for Computing
Machinery (ACM), the Canadian Academy of Engineering (CAE), the Gesellschaft für
Informatik (GI) in Germany and the IEEE. He is a Member of the Royal Irish Academy.
Parnas is the author of more than 270 papers and reports. Many have been repeatedly
republished and are considered classics. A collection of his papers can be found in:
Hoffman, D.M., Weiss, D.M. (eds.), “Software Fundamentals: Collected Papers
by David L. Parnas”, Addison-Wesley, 2001, 664 pgs., ISBN 0-201-70369-6,.
Dr. Parnas is Professor Emeritus at McMaster University in Hamilton Canada,and at the
University of Limerick Ireland and an Honorary Professor at Ji Lin University in China. He
is President of Middle Road Software.
