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This paper describes a new approach to testing that uses combinatorial designs to generate tests that cover the pairwise, triple, or n-way combinations of a system's test parameters. These are the parameters that determine the system's test scenarios. Examples are system configuration parameters, user inputs and other external events. We implemented this new method in the AETG system. The AETG system uses new combinatorial algorithms to generate test sets that cover all valid n-way parameter combinations. The size of an AETG test set grows logarithmically in the number of test parameters. This allows testers to define test models with dozens of parameters. The AETG system is used in a variety of applications for unit, system, and interoperability testing. It has generated both high-level test plans and detailed test cases. In several applications, it greatly reduced the cost of test plan development.

We consider the classic problem of designing heaps. Standard binary heaps run faster in practice than Fibonacci heaps but have worse time guarantees. Here we present a new type of heap that runs faster in practice than both standard binary and Fibonacci heaps, but has asymptotic insert times arbitrarily better than O(log n), namely O((log n) 1/m ) for arbitrary positive integer m. Our heap is defined recursively and maximum run time speed up occurs when a recursion depth of 1 is used, i.e. a heap of heaps.

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