Some Applications from Software Testing for a Discrete Structures Course
Titel:
Some Applications from Software Testing for a Discrete Structures Course
Auteur:
Abernethy, Ken
Verschenen in:
Computer science education
Paginering:
Jaargang 2 (1991) nr. 1 pagina's 1-30
Jaar:
1991
Inhoud:
The software development community is becoming increasingly aware of the importance of improved software testing, and interest is growing rapidly in new methods that promise to make testing more effective. However, software testing is a topic that is often ignored or relegated to brief components of specific upper-level courses in the computer science curriculum. On the other hand, instructors of discrete structures courses recognize a need for practical and accessible applications of many of the topics that are discussed in their courses. In this article a number of such applications are given through a discussion of the use of complexity and coverage metrics in software testing. While no attempt is made to give a complete discussion of all the issues related to the use of such metrics, the presentation is organized in a way that provides a coherent introductory tutorial on this subject--as opposed to simply cataloging certain applications. It is hoped that this approach will enable students in a discrete structures course to better appreciate how many of the topics they are studying are used in developing approaches to an important practical problem in computer science. In the course of the discussion, such concepts as directed graphs, spanning trees for graphs, decomposition trees for graphs, partial orderings, Hasse diagrams, the fundamental principle of counting, linear combinations of vectors, recursive definitions on tree structures, and functions and mappings are shown to be central in the definition, analysis, and applications of such metrics. To enhance the classroom use of this material, a section of exercises that develop and expand the ideas discussed in the article proper is included, and a section providing references and suggested additional reading is provided for those students or instructors who wish to further pursue any of the topics introduced.
Tijdschrift beschrijving