Abstract:
Program dependencies model the ways program entities – statements, expressions, variables, control flow, etc. – interact with each other. Therefore, they are explicitly or implicitly the basis of static (source-based) and dynamic (execution-based) program analysis. The basic two are the Control and Data Dependencies. The former accounts for the selection of program statements for execution, while the latter models data exchange between program statements. Both are binary relations on the set of nodes in the flowgraph but they can be used as a basis to define other heterogeneous relations, e.g., between statements and variables. The discussion is illustrated by the actual results produced by STAD 4.0.
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Notes
- 1.
This problem is typical for structural (white-box) program testing, see Chapter 8.
- 2.
Attraction is often referred to as postdominance or reverse dominance. Since one word is preferred to two, and postdominance might be construed as A counterpart of nonexisting predominance, attraction seems to be A better choice as it also has A programming appeal.
- 3.
We say “may” for in some cases A decision node may always evaluate to A constant, e.g. if 3>2 then …else..
- 4.
This is also known as A definition-use chain, cf [2] and under such name is used in testing, see Chapter 8.
References
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Laski, J., Stanley, W. (2009). Program Dependencies. In: Software Verification and Analysis. Springer, London. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-84882-240-5_6
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-84882-240-5_6
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