Using model checking to generate data-flow oriented test case from statecharts

Abstract

Although testing has been widely recognized as a practical means of establishing that the software meets its intended purpose, it is an extremely costly and time consuming process. Model checking is proposed as an automatic verification technique to analyze whether a system model satisfies the system properties. However, we are interested in its capability to generate counterexamples as well as its verification function. Our concern is how model checking be employed in automatic generation of test cases. In this thesis we apply model checking technique to data-flow oriented test case generation from statecharts specification. We first identify the data flow information from the statecharts. The statecharts is then translated into the form of model checker`s input. Then the properties are generated using the data flow information of the statecharts to force the SMV, the model checker we use, to generate test cases. We have conducted a case study with a real world example to demonstrate that data-flow oriented test cases can indeed be obtained by utilizing our ideas.