Path testing a program involves generating all paths through the program, and finding a set of program inputs that will execute every path. Since it is impossible to cover all paths in a program, path testing can be relaxed by selecting a subset of all executable paths that fulfill a certain path selection criterion and finding test data to cover it. The automatic generation of such test paths leads to more test coverage paths thus resulting in efficient and effective testing strategy. This paper presents a structural-oriented technique that uses a genetic algorithm (GA) for automatic generation of a set of test paths that cover the all-uses criterion. In the case of programs that have loops, the proposed technique generates paths according to the ZOT-subset criterion, which requires paths that traverse loops zero, one and two times. The proposed GA uses a binary vector as a chromosome to represent the edges in the DD-graph of the program under test. The set of paths generated by the proposed GA can be passed to a test data generation tool to find program inputs that will execute them. Experiments have been carried out to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed GA compared to the random test path generation technique. General TermsSoftware Engineering, Software Testing.

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The utilization is described of a data flow path selection criterion in a symbolic execution system. The system automatically generates a subset of program paths according to a certain control flow criterion. This subset is called the ZOT‐subset, since it requires paths that traverse loops zero, one and two times. Experience indicates that traversing this subset of program paths is enough to cover most control flow and data flow components of the program. The problem with the ZOT‐subset is that it might contain, for large programs, a large number of paths. The number of paths in this subset can be reduced by concentrating on executable paths that cover vital components of programs such as data flow components. This object is achieved by employing a data flow path selection criterion in the system. The system symbolically executes the paths of the ZOT‐subset, and creates a system of branch conditions for each one. The user determines infeasible paths by checking the consistency of each system of conditions. The system selects feasible paths from the ZOT‐subset that cover the data flow criterion. Solving the systems of conditions of the selected paths provides the user with test data to fulfil the given data flow criterion.

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