A systematic literature survey of integration testing in component-based software engineering

Component-based software engineering (CBSE) has emerged as an approach that offers rapid development of system using fewer resources and effort. The core idea of reuse and cutting down the development costs can be achieved if the components offer reliable services. Thus, integration components and testing become an important phase in CBSE. Integration of components is a very important activity. This involves understanding communication and coordination between the components. Developers are not provided with sufficient information on these components. As a result of this, understanding data flow while integrating these components is a challenge. Component-based software facilitates development of complex systems by allowing integration of reusable components. Testing components is a challenging area of research. There have been troubles integrating the components. This in turn affects the quality and reliability of the software. Our research aims at finding the existing integration testing and challenges in CBSE. The systematic literature survey is based on 49 articles collected from multiple-stage selection process. These articles have been published within the time span of 1995-2009.