[SystemSafety] a discursion stimulated by recent discussions of alleged safety-critical software faults in automobile software

[Mike Ellims]

Martyn,

Was bad software the whole cause of your purely fictional series of events,
or were there perhaps deeper issues of which poor software was but a single,
if perhaps the most obvious manifestation?

Cheers.

-----Original Message-----
From: systemsafety-bounces at lists.techfak.uni-bielefeld.de
[mailto:systemsafety-bounces at lists.techfak.uni-bielefeld.de] On Behalf Of
Martyn Thomas
Sent: 11 November 2013 14:39
To: systemsafety at lists.techfak.uni-bielefeld.de
Subject: [SystemSafety] a discursion stimulated by recent discussions of
alleged safety-critical software faults in automobile software

(I'm writing this in England. We don't have a constitution that guarantees
freedom-of-expression. Indeed, we have become a favourite destination for
libel tourists. )

Let's suppose that in a purely fictional sequence of events, a manufacturer
that develops and sells safety-related consumer products installs some very
badly written software in one of their products:
software that could lead to injury or death. Let's further suppose that an
accident happens that, when investigated, turns out to be of the sort that
the bad software could have caused.

Let's speculate that n this fictional case, the manufacturer suffers serious
penalties and as a result vows to write much better software in future,
changes their development methods, significantly reduces the likelihood of
safety-related errors in their future products, and (by acting as a warning
to others of the consequences) influences other companies to make similar
improvements.

That would be a lot of good things that resulted from the discovery of the
badly-written software and most or all of them might not have happened if
the bad software had been discovered without an accident and a finding of
liability.

Of course, this is fiction and the good outcomes described above are
hypothetical.

But a man can dream and, if such a set of circumstances were ever to arise,
why would I care whether the bad software did actually cause the accident?

Martyn


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