User-interfaces for Rule-Based Formal-Methods Environments

Formal methods offer great promise for the elimination of errors in software, but before they can be widely adopted in industry, they must be supported by good tools readily acceptable to professional programmers. Existing formal-methods tools are hobbled by (1) weak user-interfaces, and (2) severely limited capabilities for integration with other tools. GrammaTech seeks to remedy these problems by developing a professional-quality, standards-compliant, customizable, portable, common interface tailored to formal-methods applications. By effectively combining its commercial editor/ interface-generation technology, the Synthesizer Generator, and the emerging commercial technologies for component software, OLE and OpenDoc, GrammaTech aims to build a generic formal methods interface (FMI) that facilitates widespread adoption of formal methods in industry.