Programming for Software Sharing (Ispra Courses)

Most computer users are familiar with the problems of sharing software with others, and the transfer of programs from one computing environment to another. Software represents an ever-increasing proportion of the cost of computing and these costs tend to nullify all the economic advantages flowing from the wider availability of cheap hardware. Years ago it was hoped that the widespread use of high-level programming languages would help in alleviating the problems of software production, by increasing productivity and by making it simpler for users with similar problems to be able to use the same programs, possibly on different types of machines. It is a common experience that in practice this simple optimism has proved to be unfounded. It was these considerations which led us in 1979 to organize a two-week course on "Programming for Software Sharing" at the European Community Joint Research Centre, Ispra Establishment (Italy), forming part of the regular series of "Ispra Courses". With prominent invited lecturers, local contributions and through discussion sessions we examined with an audience from many countries the problems involved in the sharing and transfer of software, as well as suggesting ways of overcoming them. In our local environment we are faced daily with three problems both from engagements in software exchange in the scientific-technical field on a Europe-wide or world-wide basis, and from work with programming techniques and contributions to the international standardization process. Front Matter....Pages i-x Front Matter....Pages 1-1 The Software Life Cycle....Pages 3-13 Design of Programs....Pages 15-34 Program Structure....Pages 35-47 Programming Languages and Style....Pages 49-68 Program Validation....Pages 69-86 A Programming Example....Pages 87-95 Managing Software Development....Pages 97-107 Front Matter....Pages 109-109 Flexibility....Pages 111-125 Operating System Interfaces....Pages 127-137 Language Standards....Pages 139-147 Software Tools for Software Sharing....Pages 149-174 Program Documentation....Pages 175-188 Front Matter....Pages 189-189 Software Transfer and Sharing — An Overview....Pages 191-201 The Legal Protection of Computer Software....Pages 203-210 Experience in Multi-Machine Software Development: The NAG Library — A Case Study....Pages 211-223 Transportable User Documentation for Numerical Software....Pages 225-234 Data Sharing in Distributed Computing Systems....Pages 235-246 Fortran IV Dialect Conversion....Pages 247-262 Users’ Experience: Introduction....Pages 263-264 Experience with the RELAP Code....Pages 265-274 Front Matter....Pages 189-189 Experience with the SIMMER II Code....Pages 275-278 Back Matter....Pages 279-283