High-pressure Steam Engines and Computer Software the Problems of Exploding Boilers

The introduction of computers into the control of potentially dangerous devices has led to a growing awareness of the possible contribution of software to serious accidents The number of computer related accidents so far has been small due to the restraint that has been shown in introducing them into safety critical control loops However as the economic and technological bene ts of using computers become more widely accepted their use is increasing dramatically We need to ensure that computers are introduced into safety critical systems in the most responsible way possible and at a speed that does not expose people to undue risk Risk induced by technological innovation existed long before computers this is not the rst time that humans have come up with an extremely useful new technology that is potentially dangerous We can learn from the past before we repeat the same mistakes In particular parallels exist between the early develop ment of high pressure steam engines and software en gineering that we can apply to the use of computers in complex systems