Tree-based methods for classifying software failures

Author

Francis, Patrick ; Leon, David ; Minch, Melinda ; Podgurski, Andy

Author_Institution

Dept. of Electr. Eng. & Comput. Sci., Case Western Reserve Univ., Cleveland, OH, USA

fYear

2004

fDate

2-5 Nov. 2004

Firstpage

451

Lastpage

462

Abstract

Recent research has addressed the problem of providing automated assistance to software developers in classifying reported instances of software failures so that failures with the same cause are grouped together. In this paper, two new tree-based techniques are presented for refining an initial classification of failures. One of these techniques is based on the use of dendrograms, which are rooted trees used to represent the results of hierarchical cluster analysis. The second technique employs a classification tree constructed to recognize failed executions. With both techniques, the tree representation is used to guide the refinement process. We also report the results of experimentally evaluating these techniques on several subject programs.

Keywords

fault trees; pattern classification; pattern clustering; program diagnostics; software fault tolerance; dendrograms; hierarchical cluster analysis; refinement process; software failure; tree representation; tree-based method; Classification tree analysis; Clustering algorithms; Computer science; Data analysis; Data mining; Failure analysis; Information analysis; Iterative algorithms; Pattern classification; Software testing;

fLanguage

English

Publisher

ieee

Conference_Titel

Software Reliability Engineering, 2004. ISSRE 2004. 15th International Symposium on

ISSN

1071-9458

Print_ISBN

0-7695-2215-7

Type

conf

DOI

10.1109/ISSRE.2004.43

Filename

1383139