[SystemSafety] A Fire Code for Software?

W.L. Mostia wlmostia at msn.com
Mon Mar 19 02:25:09 CET 2018


PBL - I fully agree with what you are saying.  One small issue that may not change things in practical terms.  Engineering under the engineering laws is required to be directly done by the PE or directly supervised by the PE.  Obviously work can be done within a company without this happening but if the PE's stamp is on the work (or even if the client did not require a stamp), they are still on the hook.  One big issue might be whether software development and implementation is "real" engineering.


William (Bill) L. Mostia, Jr. PE
ISA Fellow, FS Eng. (TUV Rheinland)
WLM Engineering Co.
281-728-3722

-----Original Message-----
From: systemsafety <systemsafety-bounces at lists.techfak.uni-bielefeld.de> On Behalf Of Peter Bernard Ladkin
Sent: Sunday, March 18, 2018 5:00 AM
To: systemsafety at lists.techfak.uni-bielefeld.de
Subject: Re: [SystemSafety] A Fire Code for Software?



On 2018-03-13 04:48 , W.L. Mostia wrote:
> " From what Bill Mostia described, the solution seems obvious. Everyone should get all their software engineered in Texas."
> 
> I never proposed that what Texas was doing was "the solution" to the issue of producing high quality and safe software but rather what Texas is doing in this regard.  

Sorry, Bill, I didn't mean to put words into your mouth.

> Whether licensing of software engineer will result in improved 
> software design is a controversial subject,

Yes, it is.

Licencing is one social move, and all such moves occur in a complex social context. Part of that context, by analogy with other technical licencing schemes, is that ultimately only one SE at a SW firm would need to be licenced. If things went badly wrong then that SE could theoretically be held responsible, sanctioned, and the firm could hire another one - things would not necessarily have changed engineering-culturally at all. One can even argue that that is essentially what happens at the moment.

Another move could be holding SW and SW-based-kit supply companies more accountable for deficits in their products. But the question of assigning responsibility for such a deficit is already fiendishly complicated, because of the complexity of the supply chain. It might just result in expanded legal departments everywhere, along with ensuing price rise to pay for them.

I don't think the question of getting everyone to use more reliable development methods for SW is an easy one. Neither do I think it will be the solution to the "SW problem". Requirements engineering poses challenges that are at least as big, and to my mind less susceptible to pro forma solution.

PBL

Prof. Peter Bernard Ladkin, Bielefeld, Germany MoreInCommon Je suis Charlie
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