Software: The Strategic Defense Initiative brings into focus issues of software design, software development productivity, and complexity

The author notes that for years, complex tools like program analyzers and text editors specialized for a particular computer language have been available to artificial-intelligence researchers and other elite specialists. In 1985, such tools started to become available to the average software developer in industry. So-called programming environments address issues of program design and specification as well as the more familiar problems of writing program code. Last year also saw the introduction of some significant artificial-intelligence applications-not just the tools for building them. Tools that became available in 1985 to support program development in Ada are discussed. In addition, the effect of the debate over the Strategic Defense Initiative on software developments is assessed.