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Empirical Evaluation of Test Coverage for Functional Programs

Cheng, Yufeng and Wang, Meng and Xiong, Yingfei and Hao, Dan and Zhang, Lu (2016) Empirical Evaluation of Test Coverage for Functional Programs. In: 2016 IEEE International Conference on Software Testing, Verification and Validation (ICST). IEEE, pp. 255-265. ISBN 978-1-5090-1828-4. E-ISBN 978-1-5090-1827-7. (doi:10.1109/ICST.2016.8) (KAR id:53690)

Abstract

The correlation between test coverage and test effectiveness is important to justify the use of coverage in practice. Existing results on imperative programs mostly show that test coverage predicates effectiveness. However, since functional programs are usually structurally different from imperative ones, it is unclear whether the same result may be derived and coverage can be used as a prediction of effectiveness on functional programs. In this paper we report the first empirical study on the correlation between test coverage and test effectiveness on functional programs. We consider four types of coverage: as input coverages, statement/branch coverage and expression coverage, and as oracle coverages, count of assertions and checked coverage. We also consider two types of effectiveness: raw effectiveness and normalized effectiveness. Our results are twofold. (1) In general the findings on imperative programs still hold on functional programs, warranting the use of coverage in practice. (2) On specific coverage criteria, the results may be unexpected or different from the imperative ones, calling for further studies on functional programs.

Item Type: Book section
DOI/Identification number: 10.1109/ICST.2016.8
Uncontrolled keywords: Testing, Code Coverage, Functional Programming, Haskell
Subjects: Q Science > QA Mathematics (inc Computing science) > QA 76 Software, computer programming,
Divisions: Divisions > Division of Computing, Engineering and Mathematical Sciences > School of Computing
Depositing User: Meng Wang
Date Deposited: 12 Jan 2016 14:08 UTC
Last Modified: 08 Dec 2022 21:12 UTC
Resource URI: https://kar.kent.ac.uk/id/eprint/53690 (The current URI for this page, for reference purposes)

University of Kent Author Information

Wang, Meng.

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