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ICSE 2021
Mon 17 May - Sat 5 June 2021

In many cases developers would like to test the program changes they introduce. To achieve this, a mutation testing formulation capable of capturing the altered program behaviours that are not adequately tested, is needed. Such a formulation of mutation testing would allow introducing relevant mutants, to the altered program behaviours, thereby allowing developers to focus, at commit time, on testing their changes. We thus introduce MuDelta an approach that identifies commit- relevant mutants; mutants that affect and are affected by the changed program behaviours. Our approach uses machine learning applied on a combined scheme of graph and vector- based representations of static code features. Our results, from 50 commits in 21 Coreutils programs, demonstrate a strong prediction ability of our approach; yielding 0.80 (ROC) and 0.50 (PR-Curve) AUC values with 0.63 and 0.32 precision and recall values. These predictions are significantly higher than random guesses, 0.20 (PR-Curve) AUC, 0.21 and 0.21 precision and recall, and subsequently lead to strong relevant tests that kill 45% more relevant mutants than randomly sampled mutants (either sampled from those residing on the changed component(s) or from the changed lines). Perhaps more importantly, our results show that our approach leads to mutants with 27% higher fault revealing ability in fault introducing commits. Taken together, our results corroborate the conclusion that commit-based mutation testing is suitable and promising for evolving software.

Thu 27 May

Displayed time zone: Amsterdam, Berlin, Bern, Rome, Stockholm, Vienna change

11:50 - 13:05
3.2.4. Mutation Testing: General IssuesNIER - New Ideas and Emerging Results / Journal-First Papers / Technical Track at Blended Sessions Room 4 +12h
Chair(s): Claudia Ayala Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya, Spain, Sigrid Eldh Ericsson, Sweden
11:50
20m
Paper
Sentinel: A Hyper-Heuristic for the Generation of Mutant Reduction StrategiesJournal-First
Journal-First Papers
Giovani Guizzo University College London, Federica Sarro University College London, Jens Krinke University College London, Silvia Regina Vergilio Federal University of Paraná
Link to publication DOI Pre-print Media Attached
12:10
15m
Short-paper
What Are We Really Testing in Mutation Testing for Machine Learning? A Critical ReflectionNIER
NIER - New Ideas and Emerging Results
Annibale Panichella Delft University of Technology, Cynthia C. S. Liem Delft University of Technology
Pre-print Media Attached
12:25
20m
Paper
MuDelta: Delta-Oriented Mutation Testing at Commit TimeTechnical Track
Technical Track
Wei Ma SnT, University of Luxembourg, Thierry Titcheu Chekam SES S.A. & University of Luxembourg (SnT), Mike Papadakis University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg, Mark Harman University College London
Pre-print Media Attached
12:45
20m
Paper
Does mutation testing improve testing practices?Technical Track
Technical Track
Goran Petrović Google Inc, Marko Ivanković Google Inc, Gordon Fraser University of Passau, René Just University of Washington
Pre-print Media Attached
23:50 - 01:05
23:50
20m
Paper
Sentinel: A Hyper-Heuristic for the Generation of Mutant Reduction StrategiesJournal-First
Journal-First Papers
Giovani Guizzo University College London, Federica Sarro University College London, Jens Krinke University College London, Silvia Regina Vergilio Federal University of Paraná
Link to publication DOI Pre-print Media Attached
00:10
15m
Short-paper
What Are We Really Testing in Mutation Testing for Machine Learning? A Critical ReflectionNIER
NIER - New Ideas and Emerging Results
Annibale Panichella Delft University of Technology, Cynthia C. S. Liem Delft University of Technology
Pre-print Media Attached
00:25
20m
Paper
MuDelta: Delta-Oriented Mutation Testing at Commit TimeTechnical Track
Technical Track
Wei Ma SnT, University of Luxembourg, Thierry Titcheu Chekam SES S.A. & University of Luxembourg (SnT), Mike Papadakis University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg, Mark Harman University College London
Pre-print Media Attached
00:45
20m
Paper
Does mutation testing improve testing practices?Technical Track
Technical Track
Goran Petrović Google Inc, Marko Ivanković Google Inc, Gordon Fraser University of Passau, René Just University of Washington
Pre-print Media Attached