Animation tool for ZOOM-S specification notation
Overview
The potential benefits of formal methods are well known within the software development community. These methods provide a discipline which, if followed, can help assure that systems are deterministic. They also provide a developer with the tools to fully describe the system in terms of the problem domain. These characteristics of formal methods make them valuable tools to improve the quality of the system being developed. Yet formal methods are rarely employed in the development of real world systems. Reasons for the lack of utilization of formal methods include the requirement of learning a new description language, complex and tedious syntax of existing formal method languages, poor integration with existing programming environments and poor tools for developing and validating formal specifications.
This project is a part of an overall effort to develop the ZOOM notation (Z-based Object Oriented Modeling notation) and an associated tool set. ZOOM provides for a consistent "Java-Like" notation which spans the specification (ZOOM-S), design (ZOOM-D) and implementation (ZOOM-I) aspects of the development effort. ZOOM-S takes the basic structure of the Z formal specification language and implements it in a syntax that reads much like Java. By using this combination ZOOM provides a tool which is easy for experienced programmers to understand and provides the disciplines of traditional formal methods.
To facilitated the implementation of ZOOM it is necessary to have a rich suite of tools to support the testing and validation of specifications development in ZOOM-S. This project focuses on the development of an animation tool for the ZOOM-S notation. The animation tool is developed in Java to support use across a range of operating systems. The tool is build based on a animation engine which can then be connected to a range of front ends so that it can be used various users interfaces and IDEs (integrated development environment). This project involves the development of the animation engine and a command line user interface for the ZOOM-S animation tool.
Current Status
- Preparing project proposal & initial presentation
Plan and Target Dates
- Phase 1 — Project identification and planning
- Identify project scope & prepare abstract (complete)
- Initial liturature review (complete)
- Develop project proposal document (5/29/2003)
- Make initial presentation (5/30/2003)
- Phase 2 — Initial review of ZOOM-S syntax
- Review of initial documentation (complete)
- Initial test cases (complete)
- Review alternate syntax (6/20/2003)
- Additional test cases & conclusions (7/4/2003)
- Phase 3 — Animation tool requirements definition
- Review existing documentation (5/29/2003)
- Review features of other animation tools (6/20/2003)
- Define initial feature set for animation tool (6/30/2003)
- Document initial deliverable (7/11/2003)
- Phase 4 — Animation tool design
- Use case development (7/11/2003)
- Architectural design (8/1/2003)
- Phase 5 — Implement animation tool core objects
- Implementation (9/19/2003)
- Midpoint presentation (9/12/2003
- Phase 6 — Implement animation tool initial UI (10/24/2003)
- Phase 7 — Tool evaluation (11/7/2003)
- Phase 8 — Final report
- Prepare report (11/14/2003)
- Final presentation (11/14/2003)