Re: Software Quality in Science

[Colin Paul Gloster <Colin_Paul_Gloster@ACM.org>]

On Tue, 9 Feb 2010, Jerry sent:

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|"Here is the link in the Guardian article to the original work:       |
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|http://www.leshatton.org/Documents/Texp_ICSE297.pdf                   |
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|It appears that this work was done in the 1990s. The paper is actually|
|fairly entertaining to read, if for nothing else how scary it is. Here|
|is a choice comment, about a commercial program for use in the nuclear|
|engineering industry:                                                 |
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|"This package climbed to an awe-inspiring 140 weighted static faults  |
|per 1000 lines of code, and in spite of the aspirations of its        |
|designers, amounted to no more than a very expensive random number    |
|generator.""                                                          |
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I am a nuclear scientist, and I confirm that software used for
supposedly simulating nuclear reactions is dangerous. For example,
HTTP://HyperNews.SLAC.Stanford.edu/HyperNews/geant4/get/phys-list/545.html

Nuclear electricity should be illegal.

|----------------------------------------------------------------------|
|"And this comment which addresses the use of Ada:                     |
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|"In C, note that function prototypes were well used only around 60% of|
|the time and as a result, interface faults accounted for about 24% of |
|the total. In other words, if function prototypes were mandated in all|
|C functions, 24% of all serious faults would disappear.  The          |
|computational scientist should not use this as an argument in favour  |
|of C++ or Ada in which they are mandated. A large number of new       |
|failure modes result from this action, which lack of space prohibits  |
|further discussion here. The net result of changing languages appears |
|to be that the overall defect density appears to be about the same,   |
|(Hatton 1997). In other words, when a language corrects one           |
|deficiency, it appears to add one of its own.""                       |
|----------------------------------------------------------------------|

Why did that entertain you?