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Test-Suite Reduction and Prioritization for Modified Condition/Decision Coverage
IEEE Transactions on Software Engineering
Volume 29, Number 3, March 2003
James Jones and Mary Jean Harrold
Abstract
Software testing is particularly
expensive for developers of high-assurance software, such as software
that is produced for commercial airborne systems.
One reason for this expense is the Federal Aviation Administration's
requirement that test suites be
modified condition/decision coverage (MC/DC) adequate.
Despite its cost,
there is evidence that MC/DC is an effective verification
technique, and can help to uncover safety faults.
As the software is modified and new test cases are added to the
test suite, the test suite grows, and the cost of regression testing
increases.
To address the test-suite size problem, researchers have investigated the
use of
test-suite reduction
algorithms, which
identify a reduced test suite that provides the same coverage of
the software,
according to some criterion, as the original test suite,
and
test-suite prioritization algorithms, which
identify an ordering of the test cases in the test suite according
to some criteria or goals.
Existing test-suite reduction and prioritization techniques, however,
may not be effective in reducing or prioritizing MC/DC-adequate test suites
because they do not consider the complexity of the criterion.
This paper presents new algorithms for test-suite reduction and
prioritization
that can be tailored effectively
for use with MC/DC.
The paper also presents the results of empirical studies of these algorithms.
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