Abordagem de teste baseada em defeitos para esquemas de dados

Abstract

Data are used in several software applications involving critical operations. In such applications to ensure the quality of the manipulated data is fundamental. Data schemas define the logical structure and the relationships among data. Testing schemas by means of specific testing approaches, criteria and tools has not been explored adequately as a way to ensure the quality of data defined by schemas. This work proposes a testing approach based on fault classes usually identified in data schemas. A data metamodel is defined to specify the schemas that can be tested and the constraints to the data in schemas. This testing approach provides means for revealing faults related to incorrect or absent definition of constraints for the data in the schema. The approach includes the automatic generation of a test set which contains data instances and queries to these instances; the data instances and queries are generated according to patterns defined in each fault class. Experiments in the contexts of Web and database applications were carried out to illustrate the testing approach application.