Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Reduction of Computational Cost in Mutation Testing by Sampling Mutants

  • Conference paper
New Results in Dependability and Computer Systems

Part of the book series: Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing ((AISC,volume 224))

Abstract

The objective of this chapter is to explore the reduction of computational costs of mutation testing by randomly sampling mutants. Several experiments were conducted in the Eclipse environment using MuClipse and CodePro plugins and especially designed and implemented tools: Mutants Remover and Console Output Analyser. Six types of mutant’ subsets were generated and examined. Mutation score and the source code coverage were used to evaluate the effectiveness of mutation testing with subsets of mutants. The ability to detect errors introduced “on purpose” in the source code was also examined.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Log in via an institution
Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 169.00
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 219.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

References

  1. Jia, Y., Harman, M.: An Analysis and Survey of the Development of Mutation Testing. Technical report TR-09-06, Crest Centre, Kong’s College London (1996), http://www.dcs.kcl.ac.uk/pg/jiayue/repository/TR-09-06.pdf (accessed 2010)

  2. Mutation repository, http://www.dcs.kcl.ac.uk/pg/jiayue/repository (accessed 2012)

  3. Bashir, B.M., Nadeem, A.: Object Oriented Mutation Testing: A Survey. IEEE (2012), 978-1-4673-4451-7/12

    Google Scholar 

  4. Mathur, A.P.: Mutation Testing. In: Marciniak, J.J. (ed.) Encyclopedia of Software Engineering, pp. 707–713 (1994)

    Google Scholar 

  5. Schuler, D., Zeller, A.: (Un-)covering equivalent mutants. In: Proc. ICST, pp. 45–54 (2010)

    Google Scholar 

  6. Voas, J.M., Miller, K.W.: Software testability: the new verification. IEEE Softw. 12(3), 17–28 (1995)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. Grun, B., Schuler, D., Zeller, A.: The impact of equivalent mutants. In: Proceedings of the 4th International Workshop on Mutation Testing (2009)

    Google Scholar 

  8. Hierons, R., Harman, M., Danicic, S.: Using program slicing to assist in the detection of equivalent mutants. Softw. Test. Verif. Rel. 9(4), 233–262 (1999)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  9. Offutt, A.J., Craft, W.M.: Using compiler optimization techniques to detect equivalent mutants. Softw. Test. Verif. Rel. 4(3), 131–154 (1994)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Offutt, A.J., Pan, J.: Automatically detecting equivalent mutants and infeasible paths. Softw. Test. Verif. Rel. 7(3), 165–192 (1997)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  11. MuClipse (2012), http://muclipse.sourceforge.net/index.php (accessed 2012)

  12. Madeyski, L., Radyk, R.: Judy - A Mutation Testing Tool for Java. IET Software 4(1), 32–42 (2010), doi:10.1049/iet-sen.2008.0038

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Jumble, http://jumble.sourceforge.net/index.ht (accessed 2010)

  14. Acree, A.T.: On mutation. Ph.D. thesis, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia (1980)

    Google Scholar 

  15. Budd, T.A.: Mutation analysis of program test data. Ph.D. thesis, Yale Univesity, New Haven, Connecticut (1980)

    Google Scholar 

  16. Mathur, A.P., Wong, W.E.: Reducing the cost of mutation testing: an empirical study. J. Syst. Softw. 31(3), 185–196 (1995)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  17. DeMillo, R.A., Guindi, D.S., King, K.N., McCracken, W.M., Offutt, A.J.: An extended overview of the Mothra software testing environment. In: Proc. of the Second Workshop on Software Testing, Verification, and Analysis, pp. 142–151 (July 1988)

    Google Scholar 

  18. Scholive, M., Beroulle, V., Robach, C.: Mutation Sampling Technique for the Generation of Structural Test Data. In: Proc. of the Conf. on Design, Automation and Test in Europe, vol. 2, pp. 1022–1023 (March 2005)

    Google Scholar 

  19. Offutt, J., Rothermel, G., Zapf, C.: An experimental determination of sufficient mutation operators. ACM Trans. on Soft. Eng. and Methodology 5(2), 99–118 (1996)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. DeMillo, R.A., Offutt, A.J.: Constraint-based automatic test data generation. IEEE Trans. on Soft. Eng. 17(9), 900–910 (1991)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  21. Mresa, E.S., Bottaci, L.: Efficiency of mutation operators and selective mutation strategies: An empirical study. Soft. Testing, Ver. and Rel. 9(4), 205–232 (1999) ISSN: 09600833

    Google Scholar 

  22. Patrick, M., Oriol, M., Clark, J.A.: MESSI: Mutant Evaluation by Static Semantic Interpretation. In: 2012 IEEE Fifth Int. Conf. on Software Testing, Verification and Validation, pp. 711–719 (2012), doi:10.1109/ICST.2012.161

    Google Scholar 

  23. CodePro JUnit Demo (2012), https://developers.google.com/java-dev-tools/codepro/doc/features/junit/CodeProJUnitDemo.zip (accessed 2012)

  24. Kulesza, K.: Mutation testing computational cost reduction using mutants sampling and selective mutation. M.Sc. thesis, Institute of Computer Science, Warsaw University of Technology (September 2012)

    Google Scholar 

  25. CoffeeMaker, http://agile.csc.ncsu.edu/SEMaterials/tutorials/coffee_maker (accessed April 2012)

  26. CodePro JUnit Demo, https://developers.google.com/java-dev-tools/codepro/doc/features/junit/CodeProJUnitDemo.zip (accessed 2012)

  27. Godlewski, Ł.: MapMaker. Institute of Computer Science, Warsaw University of Technology (2008)

    Google Scholar 

  28. Suchowski, J.: Network game – NetworkShipsBattle. Institute of Computer Science, Warsaw University of Technology (2010)

    Google Scholar 

  29. jet-tetris, http://sourceforge.net/projects/jet-tetris (accessed 2012)

  30. javasol, http://sourceforge.net/projects/javasol (accessed May, 2012)

  31. Bluemke, I., Kulesza, K.: A Comparison of Dataflow and Mutation Testing of Java Methods. In: Zamojski, W., Kacprzyk, J., Mazurkiewicz, J., Sugier, J., Walkowiak, T. (eds.) Dependable Computer Systems. AISC, vol. 97, pp. 17–30. Springer, Heidelberg (2011)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  32. Frankl, P.G., Weiss, S.N., Hu, C.: All-uses versus mutation testing: an experimental comparison of effectiveness. J. Syst. Softw. 38(3), 235–253 (1997)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  33. Andrews, J.H., Briand, L.C., Labiche, Y.: Is mutation an appropriate tool for testing experiments? In: Proc. ICSE, pp. 402–411 (2005)

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Computer Science, Warsaw University of Technology, Nowowiejska 15/19, 00-665, Warsaw, Poland

    Ilona Bluemke & Karol Kulesza

Authors
  1. Ilona Bluemke
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Karol Kulesza
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Ilona Bluemke .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. , Institute of Computer Engineering, Wrocław University of Technology, ul. Janiszewskiego 11/17, Wrocław, 50-372, Poland

    Wojciech Zamojski

  2. , Institute of Computer Engineering, Wrocław University of Technology, ul. Janiszewskiego 11/17, Wrocław, 50-372, Poland

    Jacek Mazurkiewicz

  3. , Institute of Computer Engineering, Wrocław University of Technology, ul. Janiszewskiego 11/17, Wrocław, 50-372, Poland

    Jarosław Sugier

  4. , Institute of Computer Engineering, Wrocław University of Technology, ul. Janiszewskiego 11/17, Wrocław, 50-372, Poland

    Tomasz Walkowiak

  5. , Systems Research Institute, Polish Academy of Sciences, ul. Newelska 6, Warszawa, 01-447, Poland

    Janusz Kacprzyk

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2013 Springer International Publishing Switzerland

About this paper

Cite this paper

Bluemke, I., Kulesza, K. (2013). Reduction of Computational Cost in Mutation Testing by Sampling Mutants. In: Zamojski, W., Mazurkiewicz, J., Sugier, J., Walkowiak, T., Kacprzyk, J. (eds) New Results in Dependability and Computer Systems. Advances in Intelligent Systems and Computing, vol 224. Springer, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-00945-2_4

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics

Search

Navigation