Balancing the Numbers of Detected Faults for Improved Test Set Quality

Test set quality benefits from tests that detect large numbers of faults. However, test compaction procedures target decreasing numbers of faults as they generate more tests and drop faults from consideration. This paper describes a procedure that balances the numbers of faults that tests in a given test set detect in order to improve its quality. In the first step of an iteration, the procedure moves tests from the beginning to the end of the test set. This allows fault simulation with fault dropping to create target faults for tests that were generated with small numbers of target faults. In the second step, the procedure constructs a new test set where tests with small numbers of detected faults are modified to detect additional faults. Experimental results are presented to demonstrate the ability of the procedure to improve the quality of a test set for single stuck-at faults as measured by its bridging fault coverage, and the numbers of detections of single stuck-at faults.