Functional abstractions for testing repository-style information systems

We propose a set of functional test patterns for testing a class of repository-style information systems. This class, which we call ldquoworkflow-basedrdquo, implements not only functions reading and writing from/to the database, but also workflows (business processes) that may be constrained by states of application objects. Patterns are based on models (functional abstractions) of the software product. The testing strategy combines testing of different models (hierarchy of functions, models of business processes and state/transition automata) using different testing techniques for each type of model. We discuss the patterns application to a large health care software product. We analyze the results (about 2700 test cases) and the effect of testing multiple patterns on the discovered failures and types of faults. We also describe the use of the method for testing about thirty software applications of an information system of a large retail company.