Testing aspect-oriented programming Pointcut Descriptors

Abstract

Pointcut Descriptors (PCDs) are used to specify sets of program join points with a common property where additional behavior should be applied. If PCDs are wrongly formulated, faults are injected into the program, because additional behavior will be applied to unintended join points or will fail to be applied to intended join points. In this paper we classify the types of faults that can occur in PCDs -- in terms of selected join points -- and present a two-step strategy to: 1) help the tester identifying extra join points selected by PCDs; and 2) help the tester identifying neglected join points that should be selected by PCDs in the first place. We focus on the first step but provide motivating examples and directions for both.