
A wide-spectrum language to support program specification and development (1978) - brudgers
http://sci-hub.io/10.1145/954587.954588
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euyyn
I'm out of context: Was this paper an impactful one? Does it have any ideas
that can be applied today?

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Jtsummers
From the paper (brief read) it seems like an attempt at creating one language
that could express everything from high level program specifications down to
low level implementation details. It seems meant to be paired with a
refinement calculus to perform the transformations from one level down to the
next.

In my understanding some levels are not, strictly, executable by the machine.
Though they may be used as ways of verifying their refinements?

The modes and objects remind me of more advanced type systems such as Haskell
and the MLs, a bit of Ada. The ability to mix high level specs and low level
implementation brings to mind design by contract (Eiffel), as well as the
methods used in formal specification and verification by Frama C and Spark Ada
for systems languages.

