design recovery

process A subtask of reverse engineering in which domain

knowledge, external information, and deduction of fuzzy

reasoning are added to the observations of the subject system

to identify meaningful higher level abstractions beyond those

obtained directly by examining the system itself.

In other words, design recovery aims to work out what a system

or component was designed to do rather than just examining its

subcomponents and their interrelationships.

(1996-12-08)