Jeff Tian's Research in Software Safety
My research interest in software safety is centered around
analysis and prevention of hazardous conditions
in computer-controlled safety-critical systems (CCSCS).
We have newly developed extended fault tree and event tree analysis
techniques by modeling the CCSCS in two frames,
a physical frame made up of the physical processes and environments
to be controlled,
and a logical frame made up of the computer controller.
System integrity is automatically checked by a prescription monitor
to guarantee consistency between the two frames,
and thus prevent hazardous conditions from occurring.
I am also interested in the comparative studies of software reliability
engineering and software safety engineering,
with references to topics on dynamic embedded systems,
control engineering, and optimization techniques.
Some of these aspects are summarized in the following papers
(see also abstracts for these and other related papers):
-
J. Tian,
"Quality Assurance Alternatives and Techniques:
A Defect-Based Survey and Analysis",
Software Quality Professional,
Vol. 3, No.3, pp.6-18, June, 2001.
(Particularly the sections on safety assurance/improvement and its comparison
to other QA techniques.)
-
S. Yih and J. Tian.
"Developing and Checking Prescriptive Specifications for Safety Improvement",
Microprocessors & Microsystems Journal,
1998.
Prepared by Jeff Tian
(tian@engr.smu.edu).
Last update: July 17, 2001.
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