SHF: Small: Reusing Debugging Knowledge

开发人员将大部分时间花在调试软件上。这种努力导致了应用程序的完美更改，但否则就会丢失。不存在存储所有错误描述和修复的中央存储库。造成这种状况的原因是相信调试是一种特殊的、特定于上下文的任务，而不是泛化的。相比之下，这个项目假设应用程序分解成更小的、类似的问题，人类思维的局限性意味着我们在面对类似的问题时可能会犯类似的错误。在实践中，大多数开发人员都同意这一点。当修复一个错误时，开发人员通常首先搜索过去已经报告和解决的类似错误，因为对类似错误的修复可以帮助他理解他的错误，甚至直接修复他的错误。简而言之，问题在于调试过程中获得的知识被浪费了——要么没有存储，要么无法搜索。这个项目试图通过获取和重用调试知识来彻底改变调试。开发人员可以利用社区的知识来加速调试。为此，它建议创建一个通用的bug存储库，能够存储所有的bug信息，并以bug跟踪为索引。为了加快调试速度，这个存储库将支持有效地查找类似的错误及其修复。它将成为自动调试工具的基础，这些工具将关闭的错误与打开的错误进行匹配，然后测试它们的修复对该打开的错误的适用性。在调试过程中，程序员将理所当然地查阅建议的错误存储库。将当前执行与存储库中的跟踪进行比较的监视器还可以防止错误并提高软件可靠性。该项目有望显著加快调试速度，降低软件生产成本。建议的教育创新和推广工作也可以帮助为劳动力培训更有能力的IT专业人员。

Developers spend most of their time debugging software. This effortresults in perfective changes to their applications, but is otherwiselost. No central repository exists that stores all bug descriptionsand fixes. The reason for this state of affairs is the belief thatdebugging is an idiosyncratic, context-specific task that does notgeneralize. In contrast, this project hypothesizes that applicationsdecompose into smaller, similar problems and that limitations of thehuman mind imply that we are likely to make similar errors whenconfronted by similar problems. In practice, most developersagree. When fixing a bug, a developer often begins by searching forsimilar bugs that have been reported and resolved in the past, becausea fix for a similar bug can help him understand his bug, or evendirectly fix his bug. In short, the problem is that the knowledgegained during debugging is wasted---either not stored or notsearchable.This project seeks to revolutionize debugging by capturing and reusingdebugging knowledge. Developers can leverage the knowledge of thecommunity to speed up debugging. To this end, it proposes to create auniversal bug repository capable of storing all bug information,indexed on bug traces. To speed debugging, this repository willsupport efficiently finding similar bugs and their fixes. It will bethe basis of automatic debugging tools that match closed bugs to anopen bug, then test the applicability of their fixes to that openbug. Programmers will consult the proposed bug repository as a matterof course during debugging. Monitors that compare the currentexecution against traces in the repository can also prevent bugs andimprove software reliability. This project promises to significantlyspeed up debugging and reduce software production cost. The proposededucational innovations and outreach efforts can also help train morecapable IT professionals for the workforce.