  The increasing relevance of areas such as real-time and embedded systems,
pervasive computing, hybrid systems control, and biological and social systems
modeling is bringing a growing attention to the temporal aspects of computing,
not only in the computer science domain, but also in more traditional fields of
engineering.
  This article surveys various approaches to the formal modeling and analysis
of the temporal features of computer-based systems, with a level of detail that
is suitable also for non-specialists. In doing so, it provides a unifying
framework, rather than just a comprehensive list of formalisms.
  The paper first lays out some key dimensions along which the various
formalisms can be evaluated and compared. Then, a significant sample of
formalisms for time modeling in computing are presented and discussed according
to these dimensions. The adopted perspective is, to some extent, historical,
going from "traditional" models and formalisms to more modern ones.
