Welcome Features Quotes Upcoming Contact F.A.Q. Demo   Building Quality into Components -- Testing and Debugging   A book edited by Sami Beydeda and Volker Gruhn, University of Leipzig, Germany Introduction A major trend in software engineering is that of component-based development. The underlying idea of component-based development is to use existing components for the construction of a software system and to construct it by integrating them instead of programming the software system from scratch. The expected benefits of using components in software development and the motivations for component-based development are manifold. Among others, quality of the software system developed is expected to be positively affected by the use of components. Components are expected to reach a high level of quality in a short period of time and software systems consisting of such components to inherit this high level of quality. However, this expectation does not always hold in practice. Quality improvements, particularly when using specific type components characterized as commercial-off-the-shelf (COTS), cannot be easily achieved and require certain provisions. Such provisions are testing and debugging. The Overall Objective of the Book The objective of the book is twofold. It firstly aims at outlining the problems and open issues encountered in testing and debugging of COTS components. Testing and debugging of COTS components differ in various aspects from those of other software entities. The differences are not always obvious and need to be outlined. It secondly aims at summarizing current research in the area of COTS components testing and debugging. In recent years, significant progress has been achieved in research in the area of testing and debugging of COTS components. The Target Audience The target audience will be professionals and researchers working in the area of COTS component-based software development with a focus on quality assurance. The problems and open issues outlined together with the summary of the contributions to the area will give a clear insight in the progress achieved and in the possible directions of future research. The Contents of the Book The book will consists of two parts. These parts and the chapter encompassed in these parts are briefly described. Part I: Testing and debugging - the component developer view The first part of the book will consider the tasks of testing and debugging from the perspective of the developer of a COTS component. A problem often encountered in component-based development is a lack of information. This concerns the developer insofar that the actual context in which the component will be used might not be known. The developer needs thus to test the component context-independently. This chapter will contain methods and tools for testing and debugging as required by the component developer for such context-independent tests. A lack of information can also concern the component user. The component user might not be able to test and debug a component. However, the developer of a component can facilitate these tasks by augmenting the component appropriately, by improving its testability. This chapter will describes methods and tools of building testable COTS components. Part II: Testing and debugging - the component user view The second part will assume the perspective of the component user and will consider testing and debugging as seen by the component user, i.e. the developer of a component-based system. In the context of COTS components, a lack of information often strongly hinders testing and debugging, since the component user does even not have access to source code. However, a number of methods are available to date which only have weak assumptions concerning the amount of information available and can thus still be applied. A lack of information can complicate the testing and debugging of a COTS component in various aspects. These aspects can be at a conceptual level such as a dependence on the component provider, but also at a technical level such as problems in tracking of test execution. Assuming that a component is augmented appropriately and possesses a certain level of testability, the component user can test and debug a component thorough even without access to the relevant information. Submission Procedure Abstract submission deadline: October 1st, 2003 Full chapter submission deadline: December 1st, 2003 Notification deadline: February 1st, 2004 Researchers and practitioners are invited to submit on or before October 1st an extended abstract and December 1st the chapter. The extended abstract should give a clear overview of the chapter and should indicate the part of the book to which the chapter will be submitted. The submissions will undergo a thorough review process and authors will be notified by February 1st, 2004. Contact Info Inquiries and submissions can be forwarded electronically to: Sami Beydeda Tel.: +49 341 97 32347 E-mail: sami.beydeda@informatik.uni-leipzig.de Volker Gruhn Tel.: +49 341 97 32331 E-mail: volker.gruhn@informatik.uni-leipzig.de