Computer Engineering Commons^™

Abstraction In Assertion-Based Test Oracles, Yoonsik Cheon

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

Assertions can be used as test oracles. However, writing effective assertions of right abstraction levels is difficult because on the one hand, detailed assertions are preferred for through testing (i.e., to detect as many errors as possible), but on the other hand abstract assertions are preferred for readability, maintainability, and reusability. As assertions become a practical tool for testing and debugging programs, this is an important and practical problem to solve for the effective use of assertions. We advocate the use of model variables---specification-only variables of which abstract values are given as mappings from concrete program states---to write abstract assertions …