Microsemantics as a Bootstrap in Teaching Formal Methods
Raymond T. Boute · Electronic workshops in computing · 2006
Introducing an elementary form of program semantics early in the curriculum provides a good preamble to formal methods. Microsemantics uses only the most basic concept in formal mathematics, namely substitution , and therefore can be presented as early as the second lecture of a freshman-level course. It can subsequently serve as a bootstrap for gradually introducing most of the other fundamental concepts of formal methods, leading up to formal systems specification and design.