Test Suite Optimization Using Firefly and Genetic Algorithm

Software testing is essential for providing error-free software. It is a well-known fact that software testing is responsible for at least 50% of the total development cost. Therefore, it is necessary to automate and optimize the testing processes. Search-based software engineering is a discipline mainly focussed on automation and optimization of various software engineering processes including software testing. In this article, a novel approach of hybrid firefly and a genetic algorithm is applied for test data generation and selection in regression testing environment. A case study is used along with an empirical evaluation for the proposed approach. Results show that the hybrid approach performs well on various parameters that have been selected in the experiments.

An Efficient Regression Test Suite Optimization Approach Using Hybrid Spider Monkey Optimization Algorithm

Regression testing validates the modified software and safeguards against the introduction of new errors during modification. A number of test suite optimization techniques relying on meta-heuristic techniques have been proposed to find the minimal set of test cases to execute for regression purposes. This paper proposes a hybrid spider monkey optimization based regression test suite optimization approach and empirically compares its performance with three other approaches based on bat search, ant colony, and cuckoo search. The authors conducted an empirical study with various subjects retrieved from software artifact infrastructure repository. Fault coverage and execution time of algorithm are used as fitness measures to meet the optimization criteria. Extensive experiments are conducted to evaluate the performance of the proposed approach with other search-based approaches under study using various statistical tests like m-way ANOVA and post hoc tests including odds ratio. Results indicate the superiority of the proposed approach in most of the cases and comparable in others.

Genetic Algorithm for Test Suite Optimization: An Experimental Investigation of Different Selection Methods

Software Testing is an important aspect of the real time software development process. Software testing always assures the quality of software product. As associated with software testing, there are few very important issues where there is a need to pay attention on it in the process of software development test. These issues are generation of effective test case and test suite as well as optimization of test case and suite while doing testing of software product. The important issue is that testing time of the test case and test suite. It is very much important that after development of software product effective testing should be performed. So to overcome these issues of optimization, we have proposed new approach for test suite optimization using genetic algorithm (GA). Genetic algorithm is evolutionary in nature so it is often used for optimization of problem by researcher. In this paper, our aim is to study various selections methods like tournament selection, rank selection and roulette wheel selection and then we apply this genetic algorithm (GA) on various programs which will generate optimized test suite with parameters like fitness value of test case, test suite and take minimum amount of time for execution after certain preset generation. In this paper our main objectives as per the experimental investigation, we show that tournament selection works very fine as compared to other methods with respect fitness selection of test case and test suites, testing time of test case and test suites as well as number of requirements.

Test Data Generation and Selection Using Levy Flight-Based Firefly Algorithm

This article discusses the application of an improved version of the firefly algorithm for the test suite optimization problem. Software test optimization refers to optimizing test data generation and selection for structural testing criteria for white box testing. This will subsequently reduce the two most costly activities performed during testing: time and cost. Recently, various search-based approaches proved very interesting results for the software test optimization problem. Also, due to no free lunch theorem, scientists are continuously searching for more efficient and convergent methods for the optimization problem. In this paper, firefly algorithm is modified in a way that local search ability is improved. Levy flights are incorporated into the firefly algorithm. This modified algorithm is applied to the software test optimization problem. This is the first application of Levy-based firefly algorithm for software test optimization. Results are shown and compared with some existing metaheuristic approaches.

Test Suite Optimization Using Chaotic Firefly Algorithm in Software Testing

Software testing is time consuming and a costly activity. Effective generation of test cases is necessary in order to perform rigorous testing. There exist various techniques for effective test case generation. These techniques are based on various test adequacy criteria such as statement coverage, branch coverage etc. Automatic generation of test data has been the primary focus of software testing research in recent past. In this paper a novel approach based on chaotic behavior of firefly algorithm is proposed for test suite optimization. Test suite optimization problem is modeled in the framework of firefly algorithm. An Algorithm for test optimization based on firefly algorithm is also proposed. Experiments are performed on some benchmark Program and simulation results are compared for ABC algorithm, ACO algorithm, GA with Chaotic firefly algorithm. Major research findings are that chaotic firefly algorithm outperforms other bio inspired algorithm such as artificial bee colony, Ant colony optimization and Genetic Algorithm in terms of Branch coverage in software testing.

Fault-type coverage based ant colony optimization algorithm for attaining smaller test suite

<table width="0" border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0"><tbody><tr><td valign="top" width="593"><p>In this paper, we proposed Fault-Type Coverage Based Ant Colony Optimization (FTCBACO) technique for test suite optimization. An algorithm starts with initialization of FTCBACO factors using test cases in test suite. Then, assign separate ant to each test case called vertex. Each ant chooses best vertices to attain food source called objective of the problem by means of updating of pheromone trails and higher probability trails. This procedure is repeated up to the ant reaches food source. In FTCBACO algorithm, minimal number of test cases with less execution time chosen by an ant to cover all faults type (objective) are taken as optimal solution. We measured the performance of FTCBACO against Greedy approach and Additional Greedy Approach in terms of fault type coverage, test suite size and execution time. However, the heuristic Greedy approach and Additional Greedy approach required more execution time and maximum test suite size to provide the best resolution for test suite optimization problem. Statistical investigations are performed to finalize the performance significance of FTCBACO with other approaches that concludes FTCBACO technique enriches the reduction rate of test suite and minimizes execution time of reducing test cases efficiently.</p></td></tr></tbody></table>

Effective Test Suite Optimization for Improving the Coverage Standards Using Hybrid Wrapper Filter-Memetic Algorithm

The continuous progress and developments in the technologies related to the database and computer has heightened the significance of selecting the features. The most common methods that are used in choosing the features often come with the peril of choosing the features subsets that are unsuitable with the opted algorithm for the induction. Few methods that include the induction procedure for validating the subsets in the feature, despites its prediction capability is computationally more intensive. So to sort out the solution for the aforementioned problems, the proposed method in the paper utilizes the hybrid method for choosing the features clubbing the wrapper filter along with the structure of the Memetic to have an improved coverage-centered test-case escalation. The hybridized procedure optimizes the test suite integrating the call-stack along with it. The experimental observations obtained also exhibits the performance enhancement and the effective ness of the hybridized procedure that leads to cost factor minimization.

An Effective Regression Test Case Selection Using Hybrid Whale Optimization Algorithm

Test suite optimization is an ever-demanded approach for regression test cost reduction. Regression testing is conducted to identify any adverse effects of maintenance activity on previously working versions of the software. It consumes almost seventy percent of the overall software development lifecycle budget. Regression test cost reduction is therefore of vital importance. Test suite optimization is the most explored approach to reduce the test suite size to re-execute. This article focuses on test suite optimization as a regression test case selection, which is a proven N-P hard combinatorial optimization problem. The authors have proposed an almost safe regression test case selection approach using a Hybrid Whale Optimization Algorithm and empirically evaluated the same on subject programs retrieved from the Software Artifact Infrastructure Repository with Bat Search and ACO-based regression test case selection approaches. The analyses of the obtained results indicate an improvement in the fault detection ability of the proposed approach over the compared ones with significant reduction in test suite size.