Mutation Analysis for Testing Finite State Machines

Mutation analysis is a program testing method which seeds a fault in a program and tries to identify it with test data, thus promoting the test efficiency. The paper investigates the application of mutation analysis in model-based testing for the modeling language of finite state machines (FSM). We describe a set of mutation operators for FSM based on the fault category; present an algorithm of selecting a test suite for the mutation testing of system models in FSM. In an experiment, other five methods of test suites generating and selecting for FSM are chosen to compare with the mutation testing method. The experiment shows that in respect of faults detecting in FSM, the mutation testing is more effective and efficient than the other FSM testing methods including D-method, W-method and T-method.