CAREER: Integrating Automated Software Testing Methods

测试是所有程序员工作生活中最经常执行和最重要的活动之一。 不幸的是，对于关键的和频繁重用的代码，手动测试通常需要花费很大的努力才能得到平庸的结果。 该项目的重点是自动生成测试模块的接口，改变系统状态，例如关键模块，如文件系统和数据结构，在许多安全或经济关键的软件系统中使用。该项目通过一个新的集成的成熟的方法，提高了国家的最先进的，结合根本性的改进，以底层的测试方法。 最有效的测试方法（每秒探索的程序路径）用于生成非常大量的唯一路径来暴露故障，而最有效的方法（探索难以到达的路径，揭示非常难以找到的故障）用于完成两阶段的方法中的测试。 其核心思想是只有在成本效益不太可能成功的情况下才诉诸昂贵的测试生成方法。该项目通过旨在向本科生介绍原则性测试的课程和教科书开发来改善软件测试教育，这是当前CS教育中的一个太常见的遗漏。航天器飞行软件，包括飞行系统中使用的文件系统和数据结构，提供了这种方法的早期应用。尽管测试预算很高，但不适当的测试方法每年仍要花费数百亿美元。 更有效的测试将提供经济效益并有助于（例如，通过航天器软件或其他科学应用）转向其他领域的基础科研和探索。

Testing is one of the most frequently performed and important activities in the work life of all programmers. Unfortunately, for critical and frequently re-used code, manual testing often requires great effort for mediocre results. This project focuses on automatically generating tests for modules with an interface that alters system state, e.g. critical modules such as file systems and data structures that are used in many safety- or economically- critical software systems.This project improves the state-of-the-art through a novel integration of proven methods, combined with fundamental improvements to underlying testing approaches. The most efficient test methods (in terms of program paths explored per second) are used to generate very large numbers of unique paths to expose faults, while the most effective method (in terms of exploring hard-to-reach paths that reveal very difficult-to-find faults) are used to complete testing in a two-stage approach. The central idea is to resort to expensive test generation methods only when it is unlikely that cost-effective methods will succeed.This project improves software testing education by curriculum and textbook development aimed at introducing undergraduate students to principled testing, a far-too-common omission in current CS education.Spacecraft flight software, including file systems and data structures used in flight systems, provides early applications for this approach. Inadequate testing methods cost tens of billions of dollars each year, despite high test budgets. More effective testing will provide economic benefit and contribute (e.g., through spacecraft software or other scientific applications) to basic scientific research and exploration in other fields.