Modern structured analysis
Elements of information theory
Elements of information theory
Decline and fall of the American programmer
Decline and fall of the American programmer
An introduction to Kolmogorov complexity and its applications (2nd ed.)
An introduction to Kolmogorov complexity and its applications (2nd ed.)
An experimental study of individual subjective effort estimation and combinations of the estimates
Proceedings of the 20th international conference on Software engineering
A Theory of Program Size Formally Identical to Information Theory
Journal of the ACM (JACM)
Applications of Formal Methods
Applications of Formal Methods
Introduction To Automata Theory, Languages, And Computation
Introduction To Automata Theory, Languages, And Computation
| Hi-index | 0.00 |
Our main aim is to propose a new characterization for the software development process. We suggest that software development methodology has some limits. These limits are a clue that software development process is more subjective and empirical than objective and formal. We use Kolmogorov complexity to develop the formal argument and to outline the informal conclusions. Kolmogorov complexity is based on the size in bits of the smallest effective description of an object and is a suitable quantitative measure of the object's information content. We try to show that notion of complexity is a suitable measure and a tool for the characterization of the software development process. Following-the paper conclusions, the limits of formal methods typifies the software development process as experimental and heuristical based, like, for example, the scientific development in physics and chemistry. Moreover, by our approach, we argue that software development is, in some sense, formally unpredictable. These conclusions suggest that software engineering is a scientific field not totally characterized by the typical work of engineering, but also by the experimental sciences methodology.