Treffer: TOWARD AUTOMATING THE SOFTWARE-DEVELOPMENT CYCLE.

This article focuses on the quest for automatic programming to improve computer science research. The quest for automatic programming in the hope that programmers productivity could improve dates back to the early days of computer science research. Expert systems are now being considered by some as tools for improving today's software-development techniques and programmer productivity. These systems capture knowledge domains in rules. However, they attempt to automate or facilitate only some phases of the software-development cycle, like debugging or maintenance. They are practical and short-term efforts improving on techniques within the current person based software approach. Some researchers advocate a more ambitious approach. They see not only a shift from manual to automatic program development, but they also focus on management aspects of large program-development projects. Those pursuing this course propose that stages of the software-development cycle, like requirements specification, implementation, documentation, and maintenance, can be automated if emphasis is placed not on the products of these processes but on the processes themselves.