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International Conference on Computer Safety, Reliability, and Security

SAFECOMP 2004: Computer Safety, Reliability, and Security pp 180–194Cite as

Automatic Test Data Generation from Embedded C Code

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Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNCS,volume 3219))

Abstract

A fundamental area of software engineering that remains a challenge for software developers is the delivery of software with the minimum of remaining defects. While progress is constantly being made in the provision of static analysis tools to partly address this problem, the complementary dynamic testing approach, which remains an essential technique in the software industry for the verification and validation of software, has received less attention. Within the software testing activity, the actual generation of test data for the purpose of automated software testing is still mainly a manual task. We present CSET (C Symbolic Execution Tool) which automatically generates test data from C source code to fulfil code coverage criteria. CSET implements the symbolic execution technique with an intermediate path traversal conditions checker and a test data generation facility. We examine how the traditional problems associated with the symbolic execution technique have been overcome using Logic Programming and Constraint Logic Programming (CLP). The approach used to handle pointer manipulations is detailed. Interprocedural results on previously published sample code and industrial embedded C code with pointers are presented.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Technology, Carlow, Computing and Networking Department, Kilkenny Road, Carlow, Ireland

    Eileen Dillon & Christophe Meudec

Authors
  1. Eileen Dillon
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  2. Christophe Meudec
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Engineering, Department of Computer Science and Cognitive Science, Workgroup Software Engineering, University Duisburg-Essen, Germany

    Maritta Heisel

  2. Fraunhofer Institute Experimental Software Engineering, Kaiserslautern, Germany

    Peter Liggesmeyer

  3. Bundesamt fuer Sicherheit in der Informationstechnik, Godesberger Allee 185-189, 53175, Bonn, Germany

    Stefan Wittmann

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© 2004 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

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Dillon, E., Meudec, C. (2004). Automatic Test Data Generation from Embedded C Code. In: Heisel, M., Liggesmeyer, P., Wittmann, S. (eds) Computer Safety, Reliability, and Security. SAFECOMP 2004. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 3219. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-30138-7_16

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-30138-7_16

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-23176-9

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-30138-7

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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