Using Algebra Graph Representation to Detect Pairwise-Constraint Software Faults

Automatic fault detection, localization, and repairing have always been a research hot spot. Because software faults can appear anywhere in a software, it is impossible to automatically repair all types of faults. One possible solution is to detect, localize, and fix a specific fault each time according to the fault signature pattern. Along this direction, we propose an approach that detects pairwise-constraint software faults using algebra graph representation. The approach takes a program and a pairwise-constraint as inputs and generates a fault report for programmers. It firstly generates a constraint control flow graph (CFG) that is labeled using pairwise constraint and then translates the constraint CFG as a path expression using algebra graph representation, which is an abstract path model for the program. Finally, it employs a detection algorithm to detect whether the program contains pairwise-constraint faults. We perform case studies to validate the effectiveness of our approach. The preliminary results show that the approach can detect pairwise-constraint software faults before software testing.