Teaching Scientific Method for Real-Time Software Engineering

  • Authors:
  • David A. Dampier;Ronald E. Wilson

  • Affiliations:
  • -;-

  • Venue:
  • CSEET '00 Proceedings of the 13th Conference on Software Engineering Education & Training
  • Year:
  • 2000

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Abstract

In examining the literature on software engineering, we have noticed that the prevalent opinion is that people being hired today to develop software have little or no training in scientific methods. The result of this phenomenon is that developers often do not know how to systematically develop software that is reliable and of high quality. This factor is especially important in the engineering of real-time embedded software, where "shoot from the hip" software development can lead to devastating failures.We feel that understanding the process of science is key to ensuring quality and reliability in all systems, especially critical ones. This premise is founded on the belief that by understanding the scientific process, the practice of software engineering would be greatly enhanced and strengthened. Our intent is to demonstrate how the software engineering process and the scientific process are similar, and how university programs can benefit from adding scientific method instruction to their curriculums.