Program instrumentation for the detection of software anomalies
Loading...
Citations
Altmetric:
Altmetric::
Download
Associated Records
Authors
File Licence
Editors
Date
1985
Source Title
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Melbourne Authors
Affiliation
Department of Computer Science
Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering
Department of Computer Science and Software Engineering
Document Type
Masters Research thesis
Subject Code
Citation
Price, D. A. (1985). Program instrumentation for the detection of software anomalies . Masters Research thesis, Department of Computer Science, The University of Melbourne.
Access Status
Only available to University of Melbourne staff and students, login required
DOI
Access URL
Open Access URL
Open Access at PMC
Linked Resource URL
NHMRC Grant Code
ARC Grant Code
Description
© 1985 David Andrew Price
Abstract
This thesis examines the automated detection of program errors through the insertion of software instruments into the source to flag anomalies at run-time. Anomalies are located using data flow analysis and pointer checking.
Explicit state variables are eliminated using the address and size of an object as keys to an implicit state variable. Expressions are functionally instrumented, that is, instrumented without decomposition. Dead definitions are characterized by a new statement-based dead-on-all-paths criterion. Inefficient definition anomalies are flagged for live definitions which are dead on most paths. The handling of objects whose parts are in many states is elucidated. The utilization of reference-only states to detect parameter anomalies for certain languages is proposed. The pointer range error and the accompanying concept of ‘base’ are invented.
All of these innovations are original contributions to the field. The software tool DDF was written by the author to apply the above ideas to the C programming language.
Notes
Terms of Use
Keywords
computer programs, debugging in computer science, testing