VNM: A Novel Method to Reduce the Overhead of Program Instrumentation

In this paper, an improved method of super block method (SBM) is presented for software testing. The primary idea of the method, called virtual node method (VNM), is to add virtual nodes to the control flow before the SBM is used. The same with the SBM, the VNM can help testers use minimal test cases to cover 100% blocks or achieve a desired coverage. Moreover, it can be used to reduce the overhead of program instrumentation for coverage testing by reducing the redundancies in the SBM. Essentially, the total overhead of program instrumentation is reduced not only by inserting fewer probes, which is realized by the SBM, but also by inserting the probes among the codes that are less likely to be executed. The experimental results show that the overhead of program instrumentation is further reduced by the VNM compared with the SBM.