Trace-Based Memory Aliasing Across Program Versions

One of the major costs of software development is associated with testing and validation of successive versions of software systems. An important problem encountered in testing and validation is memory aliasing, which involves correlation of variables across program versions. This is useful to ensure that existing invariants are preserved in newer versions and to match program execution histories. Recent work in this area has focused on trace-based techniques to better isolate affected regions. A variation of this general approach considers memory operations to generate more refined impact sets. The utility of such an approach eventually relies on the ability to effectively recognize aliases. In this paper, we address the general memory aliasing problem and present a probabilistic trace-based technique for correlating memory locations across execution traces, and associated variables in program versions. Our approach is based on computing the log-odds ratio, which defines the affinity ...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2006
• Where: FASE
• Authors: Murali Krishna Ramanathan, Suresh Jagannathan, Ananth Grama
• Keywords: Aliasing, FASE 2006, Memory Aliasing Problem, Program Versions, Software Engineering