ASCE™ - Graphical Argumentation

The Assurance and Safety Case Environment ASCE) is a practical and usable desktop tool for building, reviewing and evaluating safety cases and other technical arguments. It presents the argument graphically which acts as a map for the overall argument structure. Underneath each node is the full text of the argument with links to external supporting documentation.

ASCE supports both ASCAD (Claims Arguments Evidence - screenshot of use) and GSN (Goal Structuring Notation -screenshot of use - developed at the University of York) notations for safety argumentation.

ASCE goes beyond standard word processors - the usual tools for building safety cases - to support the development and presentation of a hypertextual safety case which shows the safety argument structure in a graphical format, and a visual differentiation between material acting as safety claims, arguments and evidence. It has a graphical tool for creating and presenting the safety argument structure and a powerful editor for editing the content of the nodes in the graphical network. Users can quickly build a safety case from existing documentation (such as word processed documents) and use the linking facilities of ASCE to bring out their safety arguments implicit in their documentation.