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6 - State Testing

State testing involves defining input sequences that return the system to its initial state, and specifying the expected next state, transition, and outcome for each step in each input sequence. A set of tests then consists of input sequences, corresponding transitions/next states, and outcome sequences. Identifying all possible states, transitions, and outcomes helps uncover bugs, as does justifying all states and transitions. Explicitly specifying the expected behavior for every combination of input and state will find the most bugs. Input sequences that cover all states and transitions are a minimum requirement. It is important to record state transitions in addition to outputs during testing. Designing state-based tests yields greater benefits than just running the tests.

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43 views2 pages

6 - State Testing

State testing involves defining input sequences that return the system to its initial state, and specifying the expected next state, transition, and outcome for each step in each input sequence. A set of tests then consists of input sequences, corresponding transitions/next states, and outcome sequences. Identifying all possible states, transitions, and outcomes helps uncover bugs, as does justifying all states and transitions. Explicitly specifying the expected behavior for every combination of input and state will find the most bugs. Input sequences that cover all states and transitions are a minimum requirement. It is important to record state transitions in addition to outputs during testing. Designing state-based tests yields greater benefits than just running the tests.

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murtajiz110
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STATE TESTING

Notes taken from Boris Beizer books:

Define a set of covering input sequences that get back to the initial state when starting from the initial state
For each step in each input sequence, define the expected next state, the expected transition, and the expected
outcome.
A set of tests, then, consists of three sets of sequences:
Input sequences
Corresponding transitions or next-state names
Outcome sequences
Simply identifying the factors that contribute to the state, calculating the total number of states, and comparing this
number to the designer's notion catches some bugs
Insisting on a justification for all supposedly dead, unreachable, and impossible states and transitions catches a few
more bugs
Insisting on an explicit specification of the transition and output for every combination of input and state catches
many more bugs
A set of input sequences that provide coverage of all state graph nodes and links is a mandatory minimum
requirement
In executing state tests, it is essential that means be provided (e.g. instrumentation software) to record the sequence
of states (e.g. transitions) resulting from the input sequence and not just the outputs that result from the input
sequence.
More than most test methods, state-graph tests yield their biggest payoffs during the design of the tests rather than
during the running thereof.
What to model:
Any processing where the output is based on the occurrence of one or more sequences of events, such as
detection of specified input sequences, sequential format validation, and other situations in which the order of inputs
is important
Most protocols between systems, between humans and machines, between modules within a system
Device handlers such as tape handlers, disc handlers, and the like, that involve complicated retry and recovery
procedures if the action depends on the state.
Transaction flows where the transactions are such that they can stay in the system indefinitely. For example,
online users, tasks in a multi-programming environment
High-level control functions within an operating system. Transitions between user states, supervisor's states, and
so on. Security handling of records, permission for read/write/modify privileges, priority interrupts and transitions
between interrupt states and levels, recovery issues and the safety state of records and/or processes with respect to
recording recovery data
The behaviour of the system with respect to resource management and what it will do when various levels of
resource utilization are reached. Any control function that involves responses to thresholds where the system's action
depends not just on the threshold value, but also on the direction in which the threshold is crossed. This is a normal
approach to control functions. A threshold passage in one direction stimulates a recovery function, but that recovery
function is not suspended until a second, lower threshold is passed going the other way.
Whenever a function is directly and explicitly implemented as one or more state-transition tables.

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