  Context: Formal methods (FMs) have been around for a while, still being
unclear how to leverage their benefits, overcome their challenges, and set new
directions for their improvement towards a more successful transfer into
practice. Objective: We study the use of formal methods in mission-critical
software domains, examining industrial and academic views. Method: We perform a
cross-sectional on-line survey. Results: Our results indicate an increased
intent to apply FMs in industry, suggesting a positively perceived usefulness.
But the results also indicate a negatively perceived ease of use. Scalability,
skills, and education seem to be among the key challenges to support this
intent. Conclusions: We present the largest study of this kind so far (N =
216), and our observations provide valuable insights, highlighting directions
for future theoretical and empirical research of formal methods. Our findings
are strongly coherent with earlier observations by Austin and Parkin (1993).
