Assisting requirement formalization by means of natural language translation

A prototype assistant, NL2ACTL, is presented for the formalization of behavioural requirements for the design of reactive systems. NL2ACTL is a tool for the automatic translation of Natural Language sentences, into formulae of the action-based temporal logic ACTL. The Natural Language sentences are used to express informal requirements of reactive systems. ACTL is suitable for expressing properties of reactive systems, specified by means of process algebra terms. NL2ACTL was realized using a general development environment for Natural Language Processing and it has been interfaced with a verification environment which allows behavioural and logical properties of reactive systems to be checked. © 1994 Kluwer Academic Publishers.