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European Software Engineering Conference

ACM SIGSOFT Symposium on Foundations of Software Engineering

ESEC 1999, SIGSOFT FSE 1999: Software Engineering — ESEC/FSE ’99 pp 268–284Cite as

Comparison Checking: An Approach to Avoid Debugging of Optimized Code

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Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNCS,volume 1687))

Abstract

We present a novel approach to avoid the debugging of optimized code through comparison checking. In the technique presented, both the unoptimized and optimized versions of an application program are executed, and computed values are compared to ensure the behaviors of the two versions are the same under the given input. If the values are different, the comparison checker displays where in the application program the differences occurred and what optimizations were involved. The user can utilize this information and a conventional debugger to determine if an error is in the unoptimized code. If the error is in the optimized code, the user can turn off those offending optimizations and leave the other optimizations in place. We implemented our comparison checking scheme, which executes the unoptimized and optimized versions of C programs, and ran experiments that demonstrate the approach is effective and practical.

Supported in part by NSF grants CCR-940226, CCR-9704350, CCR-9808590 and EIA-9806525, and a grant from Hewlett Packard Labs to the University of Pittsburgh.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Science, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, 15260, USA

    Clara Jaramillo, Rajiv Gupta & Mary Lou Soffa

Authors
  1. Clara Jaramillo
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  2. Rajiv Gupta
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  3. Mary Lou Soffa
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Rajiv Gupta .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Institut für Informatik (IAM), Universität Bern, Neubrückstr. 10, CH-3012, Bern, Switzerland

    Oscar Nierstrasz

  2. ONERA Centre de Toulouse, DPRS/SAE, 2, Ave. E. Belin, F-31055, Toulouse Cedex, France

    Michel Lemoine

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© 1999 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Jaramillo, C., Gupta, R., Soffa, M.L. (1999). Comparison Checking: An Approach to Avoid Debugging of Optimized Code. In: Nierstrasz, O., Lemoine, M. (eds) Software Engineering — ESEC/FSE ’99. ESEC SIGSOFT FSE 1999 1999. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 1687. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-48166-4_17

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/3-540-48166-4_17

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-66538-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-48166-9

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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