Learning how to search: generating effective test cases through adaptive fitness function selection

Search-based test generation is guided by feedback from one or more fitness functions—scoring functions that judge solution optimality. Choosing informative fitness functions is crucial to meeting the goals of a tester. Unfortunately, many goals—such as forcing the class-under-test to throw exceptions, increasing test suite diversity, and attaining Strong Mutation Coverage—do not have effective fitness function formulations. We propose that meeting such goals requires treating fitness function identification as a secondary optimization step. An adaptive algorithm that can vary the selection of fitness functions could adjust its selection throughout the generation process to maximize goal attainment, based on the current population of test suites. To test this hypothesis, we have implemented two reinforcement learning algorithms in the EvoSuite unit test generation framework, and used these algorithms to dynamically set the fitness functions used during generation for the three goals identified above. We have evaluated our framework, EvoSuiteFIT, on a set of Java case examples. EvoSuiteFIT techniques attain significant improvements for two of the three goals, and show limited improvements on the third when the number of generations of evolution is fixed. Additionally, for two of the three goals, EvoSuiteFIT detects faults missed by the other techniques. The ability to adjust fitness functions allows strategic choices that efficiently produce more effective test suites, and examining these choices offers insight into how to attain our testing goals. We find that adaptive fitness function selection is a powerful technique to apply when an effective fitness function does not already exist for achieving a testing goal.

Research on Tourism Development of Intangible Cultural Heritage Based on Game Theory and Three-Party Simulation

Intangible cultural heritage is not only a precious heritage of humans, but also an ancient and vivid historical and cultural tradition, which contains profound cultural values. In the process of development, the development of intangible cultural heritage tourism faces problems such as the inheritors' not actively inheriting, the government's failure to take corresponding incentives and interventions, and the over-development of intangible cultural heritage development enterprises. Starting from the stakeholders participated in the development of non-heritage tourism, this paper constructs three groups of evolutionary game models, studies the strategic evolution path of each subject, and uses simulation experiments to verify. The game results show that the size of the parameters determines the choice of the final strategy, and the strategic choices of the three players are interrelated. Only by taking precise measures from the perspective of different stakeholders, can be the efficiency and reasonable development of intangible cultural heritage tourism resources be achieved and the regional economic development be supported.

Strategic Management of Higher Education Institutions in a European Context

This chapter explores the strategic management of European universities and aims to provide an overall picture of the focus of contemporary strategic research. Twenty-five articles are examined using the public sector strategic research framework. The review provides a fragmented and multidimensional picture of the strategic management and leadership of universities. It can be viewed from several different perspectives, and therefore, the emphases are also different. Additionally, this is a challenge for strategic leadership when considering strategic choices in the higher education sector. This literature review suggests that the changing environment of the higher education sector highlights the need for new processes and frameworks for universities. Despite comprehensive strategy work, higher education institutions have been unable to meet the challenges related to change. A more comprehensive understanding of strategic management theories, frameworks, and tools would give universities a stronger understanding of strategic leadership and its implications for future success.

THE STRATEGIC CHOICES IN ACHIEVING TOURISM'S COMPETITIVENESS AND PERFORMANCE AMONG HOTELS IN INDONESIA

The current debate between external strategy and a resource-based approach as a driver of competitiveness is rarely investigated in a developing region. This study investigates whether an external focus or a resource-based strategy is better for leveraging the hotel industry's competitiveness and performance in a developing area in Indonesia. The authors obtained saturated responses from 204 managers and analyzed them with PLS-SEM's two-stage and repeated indicator approach while interviewing some of them. This study developed a formative model in PLS-SEM as a better method for investigating an organization's performance than a reflective approach. Quantitative analysis revealed the resource-based view as a better basis for supporting hotels' competitiveness and performance; however, the interview revealed considerable concerns over arising externalities. This paper suggests that hotel managers improve their internal core competence instead of wasting resources and worrying about external issues.

Geometrical analysis of motion schemes on fencing experts from competition videos

Geometrical fencing is a scientific approach to fencing pioneered by Camillo Agrippa in the XVIth century which consists of characterizing the geometrical structure of fencing movements. Many geometrical spaces are involved in a duel, which evolve over time according to the skills of the fencers and the game rules. In this article, the concept of motion scheme is introduced as a flexible geometrical structure to represent fencing spaces evolving over time. The method is applied to the video of a duel of the Olympic games 2016. Five main results are presented. First, decisive actions of the duel are deduced from the distance between fencers. Second, footwork is reconstructed from horizontal movements of the feet. Third, a kinematic model is developed and compared with data in the literature. Fourth, the lunge attack is characterized and compared with data in the literature. Fifth, the role of the free hand is studied in the case of protective and balancing gestures. These findings provide rich information on the geometrical structure of fencing movements as well as on the tactical-strategic choices made by the fencers in real competition conditions. Finally, four applications illustrate the scientific value of motion schemes in fencing and other sports.

Rich kids of Europe? Social basis and strategic choices in the climate activism of Fridays for Future

In 2018, Swedish teenager Greta Thunberg began a school strike that quickly spread across the globe. After a ritual strike every Friday by school pupils to call for urgent action against climate change had gone on for several months, what had become Fridays for Future (FFF) called for various global days of action throughout 2019, bringing millions of people out onto the streets in the largest climate protests in world history. Drawing on unique protest survey data on FFF events across European cities in 2019, this article explores the structural bases of organized collective mobilization for climate justice. Nuancing narratives that focus on either the privileged background of climate justice protesters or the environmentalism of the poor, our results show the heterogeneity of the social composition of the protests, suggesting the need for cross-class alliances for mass mobilizations. Moreover, our analysis reveals that the social background of protesters shaped their attitudes regarding what institutions and approaches can be relied upon to tackle climate and environmental challenges. This suggests an important and under-studied connection between social background and the strategic choices of environmental movements.

Afterword

This short section reasserts and summarizes some of the key conclusions to the book, explaining how London responded to the strategic choices of Roman emperors and governors, initially as a gateway emporium and subsequently as a defended administrative enclave. Episodes of systematic change were also provoked by exogenous shock, and the effects of war and plague can be identified in the archaeological record from London. Imperial inputs helped London to recover from such events, but the city was wholly a creature of Rome and otherwise lacking in social capital. Its eventual failure was a direct product of the failure of the Roman administration. Some directions for future research are considered.

Chinese Local Governments’ Behavioral Logic of Early-Warning Information Release Regarding Major Epidemic Outbreaks from the Organizational Analysis Perspective

Based on the three-dimensional ‘organizational goal – organizational field – organizational incen­tive’ analysis framework, this paper attempts to conduct a comparative and diachronic analysis of the behavioral logic of Chinese local governments’ early-warning information release in major epidemic outbreaks. The results of the research show that the organizational goal, field and incentive are highly rel­evant to different strategic choices of whether local governments should, will and are willing to perform their governance function; additionally, different combinations of these elements trigger different lo­cal government behaviors. The organizational goal, field and incentive are the starting point, turning point, and end point of local governments’ behavior­al logic, respectively, while the organizational field is prerequisite for the organizational incentive to work. The organizational goal – organizational field – organizational incentive sequence reflects the se­quence and interactive relationship of local govern­ments’ behavioral logic.

The Challenges of Representing Rural Migrant Workers in China: Factors Influencing the Goals and Strategies of Labour NGOs in Beijing, Tianjin and Yunnan Province

<p>Labour NGOs operating in mainland China have played the role of de facto representatives of rural migrant workers since their emergence in the 1990s. After their rapid development for almost two decades, the introduction of the Overseas NGOs Management Law in 2017 restricted all foreign sponsors of labour NGOs, which were their main funding source. This has greatly influenced their goals and strategic choices when representing migrant workers. However, due to increased political sensitivity, few studies have explored the current challenges they face since the law was implemented. This study identifies both the pre-2017 and post-2017 goals and strategies of labour NGOs operating in Beijing, Tianjin and Yunnan Province. It also analyses six factors affecting the NGOs’ goals and strategic choices after 2017. A case study research method is used to draw on 15 in-depth, semi-structured interviews with the founders, managers and staff working in 10 different labour NGOs in the three regions. The research results challenge the applicability of four main social movement theories learnt from the west – Resource Mobilisation (RM), Political Opportunity (PO), Transnational Advocacy Networks (TAN) and Stakeholder theory – to explain Chinese grassroots labour movements conducted by labour NGOs. The results also show that labour NGOs are experiencing a significant decline after the introduction of the Overseas NGOs Management Law, but have not withdrawn from the historical stage. Many NGOs are adjusting their goals and strategies to adapt to the changed political climate and survive. Finally, this study advocates the development of a new social movement theory which could accurately guide grassroots labour movements in the context of China.</p>