OSMOSE: automatic structural testing of executables
Sébastien Bardin, Philippe Herrmann · Software Testing Verification and Reliability · 2010
Abstract Verification is usually performed on a high‐level view of the software, either specification or program source code. However, in certain circumstances verification is more relevant when performed at the machine‐code level. This paper focuses on automatic test data generation from a stand‐alone executable. Low‐level analysis is much more difficult than high‐level analysis since even the control‐flow graph is not available and bit‐level instructions have to be modelled faithfully. The paper shows how ‘path‐based’ structural test data generation can be adapted from structured language to machine code, using both state‐of‐the‐art technologies and innovative techniques. The results have been implemented in a tool named OSMOSE and encouraging experiments have been conducted. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.