IFIP WG 2.4

Welcome to the web pages of IFIP Working Group 2.4, Software Implementation Technology

Working Group 2.4 works with software implementation technologies; it is one of 16 working groups on software-related techniques that together form the Technical Committee 2 of The International Federation for Information Processing (IFIP).  In 2023 IFIP WG 2.4 celebrates its 50th anniversary.

We understand that our title is rather broad; at our meetings we frequently discuss any technology areas related to the implementation of software systems. Given the widespread use of software systems today, the topics we discuss cover a wide range of applications and techniques. The unifying focus is the interest in guaranteeing properties of the system, be it during design, development, or operation. The scope of the working group includes, but is not limited to, the following areas of concern:

• The relationship of language design to system construction, maintenance and enhancement.

• Software portability and reusability, and how they can best be achieved using newer technologies.

• Compilation techniques from analysis to code generation and optimization.

• Experience in the use of languages for building system software.

• Software and hardware environments to facilitate the design, construction and maintenance of large software systems.

• The influence of distributed technology, the internet and parallelism on the design, maintenance and efficiency of system software.

The particular focus of the group is upon the pragmatic engineering aspects of the problem: measurements, evaluation, critical comparisons, and development of economically viable techniques.

When originally created, the mandate of the group was to investigate System Implementation Languages. Over time, the interests of the group have evolved, and in 1999 we decided to change the working group name to Software Implementation Technology to make this change explicit. You can read more on the history of the working group on our History page.

Our working group meets roughly every 9 to 12 months to discuss current trends in compiler construction, programming languages, and software engineering, and in general software implementation. During these meetings we also discuss the activities and events to support in the future. We have compiled a list of earlier meetings, and where available it also provides links to relevant material.