ALBERT L. BAKER
(baker@cs.iastate.edu)
Associate Professor of Computer Science
Current Research: Dr. Baker's recent work in Software Engineering is focused on formal specification languages. He has developed a model-based, formal specification language for C++ classes - SPECS++. This is a typical model-based specification language in that class values are modeled as discrete mathematical structures and operations are specified using predicate calculus assertions. However, SPECS++ also handles inheritance, templates and objects. An executable subset of predicate calculus has been defined and an interpreter has been developed. Thus, while SPECS-C++ retains the precision and level of abstraction achieved by other model-based specification languages, it also has the advantage of yielding an executable prototype directly from a class specification. SPECS++ is intended as a practical tool usable by professional software developers to specify and prototype C++ classes.
Dr. Baker is also developing a graphics-based language for specifying concurrent and distributed systems. Computer-Aided Software Engineering (CASE) tools that can be used for specifications are typically graphics oriented, but do not support rigorous definitions of software functionality. The system under development supports formal specification of software functionality, and like SPECS++, is executable. In fact, the "message" in this graphics-based system can be modeled using SPECS++. Dr. Baker has designed several enhancements to commercially available CASE tools based on his results in abstract model formal specifications.
Dr. Baker's research in Natural Language Text Analysis has led to software systems that support the analysis of verbatim responses to open-ended ques- tions (as might be used in population survey research). These systems allow for the efficient identification, coding and recognition of the significant concepts in verbatim responses. His recent results support the identifi- cation of relations between concepts, and can be used as the basis of natural language data base systems with natural language interfaces to large volumes of natural language text.
Representative Publications:
"Formalized Data Flow Diagrams and Their Relation to Other Computational Models" (with J. Symanzik), in preparation.
"An Executable Semantics for Formalized Data Flow Diagrams" (with T. Wahls and G.T. Leavens), submitted.
"Content Analysis and Natural Language Data Base Systems," invited Chapter in Text Analysis for the Social Sciences: Methods for Drawing Statistical Infer- ences from Texts and Transcripts, C. Roberts ed., to appear.
"Testing SPECS-C++: A First Step in Validating Distributed Systems Specifica tions" (with M. Gurski), in Proceedings of the ISMM International Conference on Intelligent Information Management Systems, Washington, D.C., June 1994, pp. 105-108.
"Deliberations on Kung's Process Interface Models," (with D. Coleman), Jour- nal of Systems and Software, Vol. 15, No. 2, 1991, pp. 193-198.
"A Mathematical Perspective for Software Measures Research" (with A.C. Melton, J.M. Bieman, and D.A. Gustafson), Software Engineering Journal, Vol. 5, No. 5, 1990, pp. 277-281.