Catcher

Tool that combines static exception propagation and search-based software testing to automatically detect (and generate test cases) for API misuses in Java client programs.

Structure

The structure of the experiment folder is the following:

• subjects/ contains the subjects for the experiments. Each subject folder contains the .jar files of the projects.
• tools/ contains the tools required to run the experiment.

Execution

Subjects (config.sh)

The subjects are listed in config.sh. Comment a line to remove one particular subject from the evaluation. Each subject must have a corresponding folder in subjects/ containing the .jar file used for the analysis.

eRec analysis (tools/erec/erec.sh)

The eRec analyze is launched using tools/erec/erec.sh. The script receives as parameters the name of the subject. The folder with the .jar files for that subject and the experiment folder where to produce the experiment/<subject-name>/erec.json file used by the synthesizer.

• Inputs:
  • Subject name (e.g., jfreechart-1.2.0)
  • Folder with the .jar files (e.g., subject/jfreechart-1.2.0)
  • Experiment location where to produce intermediate files and erec.json file (e.g., experiment/jfreechart-1.2.0)
• Outputs:
  • erec.json file in the experiment location (e.g., experiment/jfreechart-1.2.0/erec.json)

Stack traces synthesis (tools/synthesizer/synthesize.sh)

The stack traces synthesizer is launched using synthesizer/synthesize.sh. The script receives as parameters the name of the subject and the experiment folder where to find the erec.json file produced by eRec and produce the stack traces in experiment/<subject-name>/stacktraces.

• Inputs:
  • Subject name (e.g., jfreechart-1.2.0)
  • Experiment location where to find the erec.json file (e.g., experiment/jfreechart-1.2.0)
• Outputs:
  • Stack traces (.log files) in experiment/<subject-name>/stacktraces (e.g., experiment/jfreechart-1.2.0/stacktraces)
  • <subject-name>.json file in experiment/<subject-name>/stacktraces (e.g., experiment/jfreechart-1.2.0/stacktraces/jfreechart-1.2.0.json)

EvoSuite analysis (tools/evosuite/launcher-1.0.sh)

See the guidelines document (catcher-artifact.pdf) for the setting of the parameters and how to launch the tool.

Synthesizing stack traces for a new project

1. In config.sh, comment/uncomment the lines of the projects for which you want to synthesize stack traces. Add a line for each new project (the name should be the name used in experiment/).

2. Execute . runsynthesizer.sh.

Tutorial on VM

See catcher-artifact.pdf

Run on VM

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1UuyJTOac9kmzIUNFvFwITFwRConfUPG3/view?usp=sharing

Subjects

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1luIkAC6q9HPhlbdvy_Y8JTKgPnp4cUVi

Main findings

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1GbiggiqCq0sha7OmiZmD3NuJuguPITFZ/view?usp=sharing

Publication

Kechagia M., Devroey X., Panichella A., Gousios G., van Deursen A (2019). Effective and Efficient API Misuse Detection via Exception Propagation and Search-based Testing. In 2019 ACM SIGSOFT International Symposium on Software Testing and Analysis (ISSTA 2019). Beijing, China: ACM.

Pre-print https://pure.tudelft.nl/portal/files/54238155/catcher.pdf