A Dependability Assurance Method Based on Data Flow Diagram (DFD)

The paper discusses the use of Data flow diagram(DFD) to assure dependability. Until now, DFD has been widely used to track data movement from input to output making it easy to organize processes and have an overall understanding of the system. However, no studies exist on dependability using Data Flow Diagrams. After examining several D-Cases (dependability cases) produced from DFD, It became clear that it was easy to support the main goal, i.e.proving system is dependable, by providing evidence, as DFD tracks every process, input, output and data stores. This paper will explain the derivation of a D-Case from DFD and discusses various aspects of this method in detail.