I enjoyed this quote from the above link: --- I have a story about Real Time Systems design that my supervisor told me years ago: At a presentation on Real T

I enjoyed this quote from the above link: --- I have a story about Real Time Systems design that my supervisor told me years ago: At a presentation on Real Time System design methodologies, during the question and answer period one person complimented the presenter on their talk and methodology but commented that it did not seem to be able to specify adequately the Real Time constraints, especially in their specific application. So the presenter asked what was their application and assured them that it should only need minor changes to handle whatever made the application special. The questioner then explained "Our application collects data and then transmits the data to another computer for storage and later analysis. The computer that our application runs on is attached to one end of a one meter long steel rod, the other end of this rod is attached to a nuclear bomb that is about to be detonated in a test. If the application has not completed all its tasks before the blast wave destroys the computer then it fails to meet its requirements. How would this time constraint be shown using your methodology?" The presenter replied "Oh, I'd never thought of that..." My supervisor then commented: "That is the difference between Soft Real Time Systems and Hard Real Time Systems".