Safety-critical software generation

Safety-critical software development is a field of active growth and research. Many of the emerging software standards and guidelines used by industries such as medical, automotive, and aerospace are placing increased emphasis on safety and reliability. Recently, the United Kingdom Ministry of Defence (MOD) has established a set of software requirements documents that are perhaps the most stringent set of standards ever developed. The aforementioned MOD standards require the use of safe language subsets. Accompanying these standards are computer-aided engineering tools that support both the production and validation of embedded software. This paper presents safety-critical software development practices and identifies characteristics needed for tools used in this process, including those used for automated coding and unit testing.