Unit Test Generation During Software Development: EvoSuite Plugins for Maven, IntelliJ and Jenkins

Different techniques to automatically generate unit tests for object oriented classes have been proposed, but how to integrate these tools into the daily activities of software development is a little investigated question. In this paper, we report on our experience in supporting industrial partners in introducing the EVOSUITE automated JUnit test generation tool in their software development processes. The first step consisted of providing a plugin to the Apache Maven build infrastructure. The move from a research-oriented point-and-click tool to an automated step of the build process has implications on how developers interact with the tool and generated tests, and therefore, we produced a plugin for the popular IntelliJ Integrated Development Environment (IDE). As build automation is a core component of Continuous Integration (CI), we provide a further plugin to the Jenkins CI system, which allows developers to monitor the results of EVOSUITE and integrate generated tests in their source tree. In this paper, we discuss the resulting architecture of the plugins, and the challenges arising when building such plugins. Although the plugins described are targeted for the EVOSUITE tool, they can be adapted and their architecture can be reused for other test generation tools as well

Search-based Unit Test Generation for Evolving Software

Search-based software testing has been successfully applied to generate unit test cases for object-oriented software. Typically, in search-based test generation approaches, evolutionary search algorithms are guided by code coverage criteria such as branch coverage to generate tests for individual coverage objectives. Although it has been shown that this approach can be effective, there remain fundamental open questions. In particular, which criteria should test generation use in order to produce the best test suites? Which evolutionary algorithms are more effective at generating test cases with high coverage? How to scale up search-based unit test generation to software projects consisting of large numbers of components, evolving and changing frequently over time? As a result, the applicability of search-based test generation techniques in practice is still fundamentally limited. In order to answer these fundamental questions, we investigate the following improvements to search-based testing. First, we propose the simultaneous optimisation of several coverage criteria at the same time using an evolutionary algorithm, rather than optimising for individual criteria. We then perform an empirical evaluation of different evolutionary algorithms to understand the influence of each one on the test optimisation problem. We then extend a coverage-based test generation with a non-functional criterion to increase the likelihood of detecting faults as well as helping developers to identify the locations of the faults. Finally, we propose several strategies and tools to efficiently apply search-based test generation techniques in large and evolving software projects. Our results show that, overall, the optimisation of several coverage criteria is efficient, there is indeed an evolutionary algorithm that clearly works better for test generation problem than others, the extended coverage-based test generation is effective at revealing and localising faults, and our proposed strategies, specifically designed to test entire software projects in a continuous way, improve efficiency and lead to higher code coverage. Consequently, the techniques and toolset presented in this thesis - which provides support to all contributions here described - brings search-based software testing one step closer to practical usage, by equipping software engineers with the state of the art in automated test generation

Modelo de mejora para pruebas continuas

La Entrega Continua es una práctica donde se desarrolla software de calidad de un modo en el que puede ser lanzado a producción en cualquier momento. Sin embargo, como parte de este trabajo de investigación se realizaron una revisión sistemática de la literatura y una encuesta, las cuales reportan que tanto la literatura académica como la industria todavía encuentran problemas relacionados con el proceso de pruebas al usar prácticas como Entrega Continua o Despliegue Continuo. De este modo, se propone el Modelo de Mejora para Pruebas Continuas como una solución a los problemas de pruebas en los entornos de desarrollo continuo. El mismo recopila propuestas y enfoques de diferentes autores que son presentados como buenas prácticas, agrupadas por tipos de pruebas y divididos en cuatro niveles. Estos niveles indican una jerarquía de mejora y un camino evolutivo en la implementación de las Pruebas Continuas. Además, una herramienta llamada EvalCTIM fue desarrollada para guiar la evaluación del proceso de pruebas utilizando el modelo propuesto. Finalmente, para validar el modelo, se empleó el método de Investigación-Acción mediante una evaluación teórica interpretativa seguida de estudios de casos llevados a cabo en proyectos de desarrollo de software reales. Los resultados demuestran que el modelo se puede utilizar como una solución para implementar las Pruebas Continuas de forma gradual en empresas con entornos de desarrollo continuo.Continuous Delivery is a practice where high-quality software is built in a way that it can be released into production at any time. However, a systematic literature review and a survey performed as part of this research report that both the literature and the industry are still facing problems related to testing using practices like Continuous Delivery or Continuous Development. Thus, we propose Continuous Testing Improvement Model as a solution to the testing problems in continuous software development environments. It brings together proposals and approaches from different authors which are presented as good practices grouped by type of tests and divided into four levels. These levels indicate an improvement hierarchy and an evolutionary path in the implementation of Continuous Testing. Also, an application called EvalCTIM was developed to support the appraisal of a testing process using the proposed model. Finally, to validate the model, an action-research methodology was employed through an interpretive theoretical evaluation followed by case studies conducted in real software development projects. The results demonstrate that the model can be used as a solution for implementing Continuous Testing gradually at companies using continuous software development practices.Facultad de Informátic

Políticas de Copyright de Publicações Científicas em Repositórios Institucionais: O Caso do INESC TEC

A progressiva transformação das práticas científicas, impulsionada pelo desenvolvimento das novas Tecnologias de Informação e Comunicação (TIC), têm possibilitado aumentar o acesso à informação, caminhando gradualmente para uma abertura do ciclo de pesquisa. Isto permitirá resolver a longo prazo uma adversidade que se tem colocado aos investigadores, que passa pela existência de barreiras que limitam as condições de acesso, sejam estas geográficas ou financeiras. Apesar da produção científica ser dominada, maioritariamente, por grandes editoras comerciais, estando sujeita às regras por estas impostas, o Movimento do Acesso Aberto cuja primeira declaração pública, a Declaração de Budapeste (BOAI), é de 2002, vem propor alterações significativas que beneficiam os autores e os leitores. Este Movimento vem a ganhar importância em Portugal desde 2003, com a constituição do primeiro repositório institucional a nível nacional. Os repositórios institucionais surgiram como uma ferramenta de divulgação da produção científica de uma instituição, com o intuito de permitir abrir aos resultados da investigação, quer antes da publicação e do próprio processo de arbitragem (preprint), quer depois (postprint), e, consequentemente, aumentar a visibilidade do trabalho desenvolvido por um investigador e a respetiva instituição. O estudo apresentado, que passou por uma análise das políticas de copyright das publicações científicas mais relevantes do INESC TEC, permitiu não só perceber que as editoras adotam cada vez mais políticas que possibilitam o auto-arquivo das publicações em repositórios institucionais, como também que existe todo um trabalho de sensibilização a percorrer, não só para os investigadores, como para a instituição e toda a sociedade. A produção de um conjunto de recomendações, que passam pela implementação de uma política institucional que incentive o auto-arquivo das publicações desenvolvidas no âmbito institucional no repositório, serve como mote para uma maior valorização da produção científica do INESC TEC.The progressive transformation of scientific practices, driven by the development of new Information and Communication Technologies (ICT), which made it possible to increase access to information, gradually moving towards an opening of the research cycle. This opening makes it possible to resolve, in the long term, the adversity that has been placed on researchers, which involves the existence of barriers that limit access conditions, whether geographical or financial. Although large commercial publishers predominantly dominate scientific production and subject it to the rules imposed by them, the Open Access movement whose first public declaration, the Budapest Declaration (BOAI), was in 2002, proposes significant changes that benefit the authors and the readers. This Movement has gained importance in Portugal since 2003, with the constitution of the first institutional repository at the national level. Institutional repositories have emerged as a tool for disseminating the scientific production of an institution to open the results of the research, both before publication and the preprint process and postprint, increase the visibility of work done by an investigator and his or her institution. The present study, which underwent an analysis of the copyright policies of INESC TEC most relevant scientific publications, allowed not only to realize that publishers are increasingly adopting policies that make it possible to self-archive publications in institutional repositories, all the work of raising awareness, not only for researchers but also for the institution and the whole society. The production of a set of recommendations, which go through the implementation of an institutional policy that encourages the self-archiving of the publications developed in the institutional scope in the repository, serves as a motto for a greater appreciation of the scientific production of INESC TEC

Continuous Test Generation on Guava

Search-based testing can be applied to automatically gener- ate unit tests that achieve high levels of code coverage on object-oriented classes. However, test generation takes time, in particular if projects consist of many classes, like in the case of the Guava library. To allow search-based test generation to scale up and to integrate it better into software development, continuous test generation applies test generation incrementally during continuous integration. In this paper, we report on the application of continuous test generation with EvoSuite at the SS- BSE'15 challenge on the Guava library. Our results show that continuous test generation reduces the time spent on automated test generation by 96%, while increasing code coverage by 13.9% on average