{"id":152896,"date":"2006-03-01T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2006-03-01T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/msr-research-item\/discovering-likely-method-specifications\/"},"modified":"2018-10-16T20:21:36","modified_gmt":"2018-10-17T03:21:36","slug":"discovering-likely-method-specifications","status":"publish","type":"msr-research-item","link":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/publication\/discovering-likely-method-specifications\/","title":{"rendered":"Discovering Likely Method Specifications"},"content":{"rendered":"<div class=\"asset-content\">\n<p>It is widely accepted that software specifications are of great use for more rigorous software development. They can be used for formal verification and automated testing. They are essential for precise program understanding. But despite their usefulness, specifications often do not exist in practice. This paper describes a new way to automatically infer specifications from code. Given a modifier method and a set of observer methods, we first symbolically execute the modifier method to obtain a set of execution paths. Then, the conditions and final states of the paths are summarized by observer methods. The result is a likely specification of the modifier method that is compact and human-understandable. The inferred specification can be examined by the user, used as input to program verification systems, or as input for test generation tools for validation, We implemented the technique for .NET programs in a tool, called Axiom Meister. Our preliminary experience has been promising. We were able to infer concise specifications for base classes of the .NET platform and found flaws in the design of a new library.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><!-- .asset-content --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It is widely accepted that software specifications are of great use for more rigorous software development. They can be used for formal verification and automated testing. They are essential for precise program understanding. But despite their usefulness, specifications often do not exist in practice. This paper describes a new way to automatically infer specifications from [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"template":"","meta":{"msr-url-field":"","msr-podcast-episode":"","msrModifiedDate":"","msrModifiedDateEnabled":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"_classifai_error":"","footnotes":""},"msr-content-type":[3],"msr-research-highlight":[],"research-area":[13560],"msr-publication-type":[193718],"msr-product-type":[],"msr-focus-area":[],"msr-platform":[],"msr-download-source":[],"msr-locale":[268875],"msr-post-option":[],"msr-field-of-study":[],"msr-conference":[],"msr-journal":[],"msr-impact-theme":[],"msr-pillar":[],"class_list":["post-152896","msr-research-item","type-msr-research-item","status-publish","hentry","msr-research-area-programming-languages-software-engineering","msr-locale-en_us"],"msr_publishername":"Microsoft","msr_edition":"","msr_affiliation":"","msr_published_date":"2006-03-01","msr_host":"","msr_duration":"","msr_version":"","msr_speaker":"","msr_other_contributors":"","msr_booktitle":"","msr_pages_string":"23","msr_chapter":"","msr_isbn":"","msr_journal":"","msr_volume":"","msr_number":"MSR-TR-2005-146","msr_editors":"","msr_series":"","msr_issue":"","msr_organization":"","msr_how_published":"","msr_notes":"","msr_highlight_text":"","msr_release_tracker_id":"","msr_original_fields_of_study":"","msr_download_urls":"","msr_external_url":"","msr_secondary_video_url":"","msr_longbiography":"","msr_microsoftintellectualproperty":1,"msr_main_download":"223378","msr_publicationurl":"","msr_doi":"","msr_publication_uploader":[{"type":"file","title":"tr-2005-146.pdf","viewUrl":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/03\/tr-2005-146.pdf","id":223378,"label_id":0}],"msr_related_uploader":"","msr_attachments":[{"id":223378,"url":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-content\/uploads\/2006\/03\/tr-2005-146.pdf"}],"msr-author-ordering":[{"type":"user_nicename","value":"nikolait","user_id":33102,"rest_url":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/microsoft-research\/v1\/researchers?person=nikolait"},{"type":"text","value":"Feng Chen","user_id":0,"rest_url":false},{"type":"user_nicename","value":"schulte","user_id":33552,"rest_url":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/microsoft-research\/v1\/researchers?person=schulte"}],"msr_impact_theme":[],"msr_research_lab":[],"msr_event":[],"msr_group":[],"msr_project":[170993,169746],"publication":[],"video":[],"download":[],"msr_publication_type":"techreport","related_content":{"projects":[{"ID":170993,"post_title":"Tools for Software Engineers","post_name":"tools-for-software-engineers","post_type":"msr-project","post_date":"2012-06-29 06:20:39","post_modified":"2021-11-12 09:09:39","post_status":"publish","permalink":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/project\/tools-for-software-engineers\/","post_excerpt":"The mission of Microsoft's One Engineering System (formerly known as Tools for Software Engineers) team is to enable the world's best product engineering teams with world-class tools and systems that help them ship products their customers love. 1ES provides tools and services to cover the full spectrum of the engineering life-cycle, from the developer desktop to product deployment. 1ES focuses on engineering solutions that mitigate the unique scale challenges that Microsoft teams face, both in&hellip;","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/msr-project\/170993"}]}},{"ID":169746,"post_title":"Pex and Moles - Isolation and White Box Unit Testing for .NET","post_name":"pex-and-moles-isolation-and-white-box-unit-testing-for-net","post_type":"msr-project","post_date":"2007-02-21 17:06:41","post_modified":"2017-06-02 11:21:12","post_status":"publish","permalink":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/project\/pex-and-moles-isolation-and-white-box-unit-testing-for-net\/","post_excerpt":"Pex automatically generates test suites with high code coverage using automated white box analysis. Pex is a Visual Studio add-in for testing .NET Framework applications. Moles supports unit testing by providing isolation by way of detours and stubs. The Moles framework is provided with Pex, or can be installed by itself as a Microsoft Visual Studio add-in. NEW: IntelliTest in Visual Studio 2015 is the evolution of Pex. 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