Abstract | ||
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The efficiency of random testing can be improved by sampling test inputs using a generating program that incorporates knowledge about the types of input most likely to detect faults in the software-under-test (SUT). But when the input of the SUT is a complex data type--such as a domain-specific string, array, record, tree, or graph--creating such a generator may be time- consuming and may require the tester to have substantial prior experience of the domain. In this paper we propose the re-use of generators created for one SUT on other SUTs that take the same complex data type as input. The re-use of a generator in this way would have little overhead, and we hypothesise that the re-used generator will typically be as least as efficient as the most straightforward form of random testing: sampling test inputs from the uniform distribution. We investigate this proposal for two data types using five generators. We assess test efficiency against seven real-world SUTs, and in terms of both structural coverage and the detection of seeded faults. The results support the re-use of generators for complex data types, and suggest that if a library of generators is to be maintained for this purpose, it is possible to extend library generators to accommodate the specific testing requirements of newly-encountered SUTs. |
Year | DOI | Venue |
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2015 | 10.1109/ICST.2015.7102605 | Software Testing, Verification and Validation |
Keywords | Field | DocType |
data handling,fault tolerant computing,program testing,sut,data type,fault detection,library generators,random testing,seeded fault detection,software-under-test,structural coverage,test data generator reuse,test efficiency,optimization,probability distribution,data models,testing,software engineering,generators | Data modeling,Random testing,Computer science,Complex data type,Real-time computing,Probability distribution,Data type,Test data,Sampling (statistics),Computer engineering,Test data generation | Conference |
ISSN | Citations | PageRank |
2159-4848 | 0 | 0.34 |
References | Authors | |
9 | 2 |
Name | Order | Citations | PageRank |
---|---|---|---|
Simon M. Poulding | 1 | 136 | 10.72 |
Robert Feldt | 2 | 96 | 5.77 |