International Business Machines Corporation

Angela Molinari

Salvatore Branca

Edoardo Turano

A solution is proposed for populating a symptom collection&#x2014;such as a symptom database&#x2014;for a software application. The symptom collection includes an indication of a set of symptoms; each symptom consists of an undesired behavior of the software application, which symptom is due to each one of a set of corresponding problems of the software application (resulting from a misuse thereof). The symptom database also includes an indication of an explanation of each problem. A corresponding method involves performing a test of the software application for verifying a correctness of the software application. The symptom collection is then populated according to a result of the test.

Automatically populating symptom databases for software applications

A solution is proposed for testing a software application. The test includes the execution of a series of test cases, each one involving the application of a predefined test input to the software application. The software application generates a corresponding output in response to this test input. A result of the test case is determined by comparing the actual output provided by the software application with an expected output thereof. The expected output of the test case is determined automatically. For this purpose, multiple auxiliary sources are exploited, such as other software applications different from the one under test. Each auxiliary source receives a corresponding input, derived from the test input, which is intended to cause the auxiliary source to provide the same expected output as the software application. The expected output is then estimated according to the actual outputs provided by the different auxiliary sources.

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Rome, Italy

Angela Molinari