Improving fault localization for Simulink models using search-based testing and prediction models

Bing Liu, Lucia, Shiva Nejati, Lionel C. Briand

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingConference contributionpeer-review

Abstract

One promising way to improve the accuracy of fault localization based on statistical debugging is to increase diversity among test cases in the underlying test suite. In many practical situations, adding test cases is not a cost-free option because test oracles are developed manually or running test cases is expensive. Hence, we require to have test suites that are both diverse and small to improve debugging. In this paper, we focus on improving fault localization of Simulink models by generating test cases. We identify three test objectives that aim to increase test suite diversity. We use these objectives in a search-based algorithm to generate diversified but small test suites. To further minimize test suite sizes, we develop a prediction model to stop test generation when adding test cases is unlikely to improve fault localization. We evaluate our approach using three industrial subjects. Our results show (1) the three selected test objectives are able to significantly improve the accuracy of fault localization for small test suite sizes, and (2) our prediction model is able to maintain almost the same fault localization accuracy while reducing the average number of newly generated test cases by more than half.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationSANER 2017 - 24th IEEE International Conference on Software Analysis, Evolution, and Reengineering
EditorsGabriele Bavota, Martin Pinzger, Andrian Marcus
PublisherInstitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers Inc.
Pages359-370
Number of pages12
ISBN (Electronic)9781509055012
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 21 Mar 2017
Externally publishedYes
Event24th IEEE International Conference on Software Analysis, Evolution, and Reengineering, SANER 2017 - Klagenfurt, Austria
Duration: 21 Feb 201724 Feb 2017

Publication series

NameSANER 2017 - 24th IEEE International Conference on Software Analysis, Evolution, and Reengineering

Conference

Conference24th IEEE International Conference on Software Analysis, Evolution, and Reengineering, SANER 2017
Country/TerritoryAustria
CityKlagenfurt
Period21/02/1724/02/17

Keywords

  • Fault localization
  • search-based testing
  • Simulink models
  • supervised learning
  • test suite diversity

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