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Fri 13 Nov 2020 08:03 - 08:04 at Virtual room 1 - Testing 3

Mutation testing research has often used the number of mutants as a surrogate measure for the true execution cost of generating and executing mutants. This poses a potential threat to the validity of the scientific findings reported in the literature. Out of 75 works surveyed in this paper, we found that 54 (72%) are vulnerable to this threat. To investigate the magnitude of the threat, we conducted an empirical evaluation using 10 real-world programs. The results reveal that: i) percentages of randomly sampled mutants differ from the true execution time, on average, by 44%, varying in difference from 19% to 91%; ii) errors arising from using the surrogate correlate with program size (ρ = 0.74) and number of mutants (ρ = 0.76), making the problem more pernicious for more realistic programs; iii) scientific findings concerning sampling strategies would have approximately 37% rank disagreement, indicating potentially dramatic impact on experiment validity. To investigate whether this threat matters in practice, we reproduced a seminal study on Selective Mutation (widely relied upon for more than two decades). The impact is stark: an inconclusive scientific finding using the surrogate is transformed to an unequivocal finding when using the true execution cost.

Fri 13 Nov

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08:00 - 08:30
08:00
2m
Talk
Baital: An Adaptive Weighted Sampling Approach for Improved t-wise Coverage
Research Papers
Eduard Baranov Université Catholique de Louvain, Belgium, Axel Legay Université Catholique de Louvain, Belgium, Kuldeep S. Meel National University of Singapore, Singapore
DOI
08:03
1m
Research paper
Cost Measures Matter for Mutation Testing Study Validity
Research Papers
Giovani Guizzo University College London, UK, Federica Sarro University College London, UK, Mark Harman University College London, UK
DOI Pre-print
08:05
1m
Talk
Developing and Evaluating Objective Termination Criteria for Random Testing
Journal First
Porfirio Tramontana Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technologies, University of Naples Federico II, Italy, Domenico Amalfitano University of Naples Federico II, Nicola Amatucci Department of Civil, Architectural and Environmental Engineering, University of Naples Federico II, Italy, Atif Memon Apple Inc., Anna Rita Fasolino Federico II University of Naples
08:07
1m
Talk
Efficient Binary-Level Coverage Analysis
Research Papers
M. Ammar Ben Khadra TU Kaiserslautern, Germany, Dominik Stoffel TU Kaiserslautern, Germany, Wolfgang Kunz TU Kaiserslautern, Germany
DOI Pre-print Media Attached
08:09
1m
Talk
Efficiently Finding Higher-Order Mutants
Research Papers
Chu-Pan Wong Carnegie Mellon University, USA, Jens Meinicke Carnegie Mellon University, USA, Leo Chen Carnegie Mellon University, USA, João Paulo Diniz Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil, Christian Kästner Carnegie Mellon University, USA, Eduardo Figueiredo Federal University of Minas Gerais, Brazil
DOI
08:11
1m
Talk
Selecting Fault Revealing Mutants
Journal First
Thierry Titcheu Chekam University of Luxembourg (SnT), Mike Papadakis University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg, Tegawendé F. Bissyandé University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg, Yves Le Traon University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg, Koushik Sen University of California at Berkeley
08:13
17m
Talk
Conversations on Testing 3
Paper Presentations
Chu-Pan Wong Carnegie Mellon University, USA, Eduard Baranov Université Catholique de Louvain, Belgium, Giovani Guizzo University College London, UK, M. Ammar Ben Khadra TU Kaiserslautern, Germany, Porfirio Tramontana Department of Electrical Engineering and Information Technologies, University of Naples Federico II, Italy, Thierry Titcheu Chekam University of Luxembourg (SnT), M: Marcel Böhme Monash University, Australia