The Cleanroom methodology demonstrates the potential synergy between formal methods and inspections. 4.3 Summary Formal methods promise to yield benefits in quality and productivity. They provide an exciting paradigm for understanding software and its development, as well as a set of techniques for use by software engineers. Over the last twenty years, researchers have drawn on formal methods to develop certain software technologies that are currently becoming increasingly popular and are dramatically altering software development and maintenance. Further revolutionary advances based on formal methods are highly likely considering research currently in the pipeline.
Many organizations have experience with the use of formal methods on a small scale.
Formal methods are typically used in organizations attaining a Level 3 rating and above on the Software Engineering Institute's process maturity framework. Increasingly, recently trained software engineers have had some exposure to formal methods. Nevertheless, their full scale use and transition is not fully understood. An organization that can figure out how to effectively integrate formal methods into their current process will be able to gain a competitive advantage.