Abstract
Specification formalisms may be classified through some common properties. Specification formalism classification may be used as a basis for the evaluation of the adequacy of formal specification languages within specific application domains. System modelers may use this classification to determine if the system modeling requirements can be met by a particular class of specification formalism. This paper evaluates existing specification formalism classification approaches by various researchers and highlights certain observations regarding the suggested classification schemes. The paper then proposes a specification formalism classification method using specification language properties. The proposed classification approach, loosely following the prototype theory for classification, maps specification language properties to specification formalisms and determines which language properties can best be achieved by different formalisms. (C) 2010 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.