A survey of system design methodologies

Computers have been employed as the controllers of various systems. Designing and implementing control software for complex systems requires the precise definition of a system and the methods of specifying how the system is to be designed and implemented. In this paper four system design approaches, functional, process-based, object-oriented, and net-based, are reviewed concentrating on their views of a system, design languages, and graphical design tools. Each methodology introduces its own notion of a system, a system design language, and a graphical design tool. Generalizing the four views of a system, an open system is defined as a net of objects interacting with its own environment. Then system design languages and graphical design tools are considered in the category theoretical context. As an application, an interactive system design tool called OBJ-NET is introduced at the end.