Title
Many-Objective Test Suite Generation for Software Product Lines
Abstract
A Software Product Line (SPL) is a set of products built from a number of features, the set of valid products being defined by a feature model. Typically, it does not make sense to test all products defined by an SPL and one instead chooses a set of products to test (test selection) and, ideally, derives a good order in which to test them (test prioritisation). Since one cannot know in advance which products will reveal faults, test selection and prioritisation are normally based on objective functions that are known to relate to likely effectiveness or cost. This article introduces a new technique, the grid-based evolution strategy (GrES), which considers several objective functions that assess a selection or prioritisation and aims to optimise on all of these. The problem is thus a many-objective optimisation problem. We use a new approach, in which all of the objective functions are considered but one (pairwise coverage) is seen as the most important. We also derive a novel evolution strategy based on domain knowledge. The results of the evaluation, on randomly generated and realistic feature models, were promising, with GrES outperforming previously proposed techniques and a range of many-objective optimisation algorithms.
Year
DOI
Venue
2020
10.1145/3361146
ACM Transactions on Software Engineering and Methodology (TOSEM)
Keywords
Field
DocType
Software product line,multi-objective optimisation,test prioritisation,test selection
Test selection,Systems engineering,Software engineering,Suite,Computer science,Feature model,Objective test,Software,Software product line
Journal
Volume
Issue
ISSN
29
1
1049-331X
Citations 
PageRank 
References 
1
0.34
0
Authors
6
Name
Order
Citations
PageRank
Robert M. Hierons12069117.63
Miqing Li2105536.73
Xiaohui Liu35042269.99
Jose Antonio Parejo4302.58
Sergio Segura5129554.49
Xin Yao614858945.63