Re: Development: A Structured Problem Area?

--- "Derek Richardson" <Derek.Richardson-aF9gUBWsH8U@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

> The question, in my mind, is still whether there
> is anything intrinsic to producing an implementation
> from requirements that prevents a rule-based solution.
> By intrinsic, I mean a property of the problem, not
> a property of the agent solving the problem - arguments
> that the best humans perform best intuitively, while true,
> miss the point.

I am sure automated implementation from requirements is possible, 
assuming the requirements can be reduced to complete, unambiguous 
specifications (like the specs for cars rolling off automated 
assembly lines). The implementation is not the hard part, it's the 
specification. Depending on your experience as a programmer, you've 
either done requirements/specification/implementation yourself all at 
once, with little formality, or you've worked in shops that formally 
separate these tasks and thereby make everything worse.

If the requirement is "make a customer database" I don't see much 
hope for automation. If the requirements include a database schema 
and a list of operations on that data, AND a defined implementation 
platform, you have what most programmers start coding from, but not 
enough for an automated solution. If you refine the requirements 
enough you can automate the code production, but the requirements 
themselves are at that point 1:1 equivalent to code, only in some 
different language.

Perhaps the key is finding the right language for expressing 
requirements. You may be interested in Intentional Programming as 
described by Charles Simonyi; see 
http://www.edge.org/digerati/simonyi/simonyi_p1.html.

Greg Jorgensen
PDXperts LLC - Portland, Oregon USA




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