Investigating the Correspondence between Mutations and Static Warnings

Abstract

This paper provides evidences on the correspondence between mutations and static warnings. We used mutation operators as a fault model to evaluate the direct correspondence between mutations and static warnings. The main advantage of using mutation operators is that they generate a large number of programs containing faults of different types, which can be used to decide the ones most probable to be detected by static analyzers. Since static analyzers, in general, report a substantial number of false positive warnings, the intention of this study is to define a prioritization approach of static warnings based on the probability they correspond to a true positive and lead to detect software faults. The results obtained for a set of open-source programs indicate that a correspondence exist when considering specific mutation operators such that static warnings may be prioritized based on their correspondence level with mutations.