🚀 go-pugleaf

Here I am, sitting on the other side of the "big pudle" where I look forward to 
reading about Z's use in academia and industry and I get my mail file jammed-up 
with lots of non-Z issues showing up.  This is, of course, in reference to the 
"Jacket and Tie" vein of articles...  I did not say this vein was unimportant, I 
just say this vein is not Z (so turn your "FLAMES" off...).

Please!  Let's get back to Z here.  There are LOTS of alt."this-n-that" news 
groups to continue this discussion of sexism, patriarchical controled society, 
et.al., ad nausium!

To start this new year in a Z way, I've got some general questions on Z's 
progress in the engineering world.

-- Can an authorative, informed source tell me what the status of Z 
standardization is?  The last I heard (July 1991) was that the project was 
called "ZIP," the focal point of the effort was John Nicholls, and that the "Z 
Base Standard" has since been adopted as a British National Standard.  Now any 
or all of this may be wrong or out of date, so corrections gladly accepted.  I 
would also like to know if the ISO has taken on a Z working group for 
standardization.  Does anyone know?  If so, who would I communicate with?

-- There was some interest in the ZED interactive and incremental environment 
from Sanjeev Dharap, K.T. Narayana (Penn. State Univ., and ORA Corp. 
respectively).  I haven't heard much in the way of comments on its use.  I would 
certainly be interested in hearing from anyone who has used this tool suite on 
either a case study or real development (i.e. the "cost-over-correctness" 
environment).

-- Has anyone heard of an effort to automate Carroll Morgans refinement calculus 
(from his book "Programming from Specifications") on Z specifications?

Please post replies to the forum.  Anything that is posted directly to me will 
be posted in the forum unless a request is made otherwise.

Thanks to all in advance!

Richard Wallace
Senior Software Engineer
Digital Equipment Corporation
301 Rockrimmon Blvd. South
CXO2-1/7A
Colorado Springs, CO 80919-2398
U.S.A.
(719)548-2792
<wallace@cookie.enet.dec.com>