This important resource presents the current state of the art in the application of formal methods to object based distributed systems. A major theme is how to formally handle the new requirements arising from OO distributed systems. The major specification notations and modeling techniques are introduced and compared by leading researchers, in several cases, the inventors of the notations. The book also describes approaches to the specification of nonfunctional requirements, needed typically in the specification of multimedia systems and security issues. Professionals in software design, object-oriented computing, distributed systems, and telecommunications systems will gain an appreciation of the relationships among the major areas of concerns and learn how the use of object-oriented based formal methods provides workable solutions.