The application of mutation testing in the context of testing and validation of coloured Petri nets / Aplicação da análise de mutantes no contexto do teste e validação de redes de Petri coloridas"

AUTOR(ES)
DATA DE PUBLICAÇÃO

2004

RESUMO

The usage of formal methods and techniques contributes to the development of highly reliable system, but, in spite of the achieved rigour, these techniques must be complemented with testing and validation activities. It should be highlighted that the cost to eliminate errors found in the early phases of development is smaller than when those errors are found in the later phases. Therefore, the accomplishment of VV&T activities - Verification, Validation and Test - starting at the first development phases is essential. Testing criteria, as a systematic way to evaluate and/or generate test cases, contributing, therefore, to improve the quality of the test activity, have been proposed for testing reactive systems specifications. A technique that has been steadily employed for specifying the behavioural aspect of reactive systems is the coloured Petri nets. Although there are several analysis and validation techniques, a usually neglected aspect is the achieved coverage, given that, in general, the exhaustive application is not feasible due to its high cost. Considering the relevance of establishing systematic methods for the test and validation of coloured Petri nets based specification, this work proposes the investigation of the viability of applying Mutation Testing to test coloured Petri nets. In this work three main goals were pursued, which can be grouped in: theoretical studies, empirical studies and tool development. In the context of theoretical studies, it was accomplished the definition of theoretical concepts to enable the application of Mutant Analysis in the context of coloured Petri nets. Moreover, a mutation-based algorithm was defined to generate test sequences for Petri nets. In the context of empirical studies, case studies were carried out to evaluate the applicability and effectiveness of the achieved theoretical results. Finally, in the context of tool development, tools for supporting the application of Mutation Testing were developed.

ASSUNTO(S)

análise de mutantes domain specific languages mutation testing software engineering software testing redes de petri coloridas teste de software linguagens para domínios específicos coloured petri nets engenharia de software

ACESSO AO ARTIGO

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