Question(s)

[Dan Purgert]

On 2023-10-24, o1bigtenor wrote:
> On Tue, Oct 24, 2023 at 5:28 PM Rob Cliffe <rob.cliffe at btinternet.com> wrote:
>>
>> There is no general way to prove that a program is "correct".  Or even
>> whether it will terminate or loop endlessly.
>> [...]
>> When you come to run your program "for real", and you have to
>> troubleshoot it (as in real life you probably will🙁), you will have
>> eliminated simple bugs in your program, and can concentrate on the more
>> likely sources of problems (e.g. misbehaving hardware).
>>
> Interesting - - - hopefully taken in the same vein as your second
> statement - - I sorta sounds like programmers keep running around in
> the forest looking for trees. (Grin!)

No, you tend to know what parts of the spec are "wrong(tm)" (either in
the language you're working in, or the hardware). 

If it comes to working with customers (as mentioned in one response),
you start to learn the questions to get at what they really want (but
that's better left to the architect :) )

>
> So how does one test software then?

You write unit tests (usually scripts or other software that can
interact with the main program to twiddle the knobs and such, and ensure
it's doing what was specified).  Alternatively, you have to program your
hardware and test directly on that.


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