Applicability of BET to Elusive Bugs in Diverse Application Areas

The basic principles of Bounded Exhaustive Testing (BET) are reviewed, as well as the concept of an Elusive Bug (EB). Initial work on the application of BET to EB's previously indicated that it provides a new and promising approach to this problem. A four-part BET/EB oriented test framework involving: fault model development, BET test generation design, failure model identification and automated oracle design is introduced. The framework provides a systematic approach to BET/EB. It was applied to three very different areas of application. The research indicated the general applicability of BET and the BET/EB framework. It resulted in increased insight into BET/EB including the development of new techniques, such as the BET/EB "inverse oracle". The research illustrated how fault models can be used to put BET application bounding on a systematic basis. It also illustrated how failure models can be used to facilitate the development of automated oracles, and how they can be used, along with fault models, to systematically define the effectiveness scope of a BET testing strategy.