English

COTS: Connected OpenAPI Test Synthesis for RESTful Applications

Software Engineering 2024-08-06 v2 Logic in Computer Science

Abstract

We present a novel model-driven approach for testing RESTful applications. We introduce a (i) domain-specific language for OpenAPI specifications and (ii) a tool to support our methodology. Our DSL is inspired by session types and enables the modelling of communication protocols between a REST client and server. Our tool, dubbed COTS, generates (randomised) model-based test executions and reports software defects. We evaluate the effectiveness of our approach by applying it to test several open source applications. Our findings indicate that our methodology can identify nuanced defects in REST APIs and achieve comparable or superior code coverage when compared to much larger handcrafted test suites.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2404.19614,
  title  = {COTS: Connected OpenAPI Test Synthesis for RESTful Applications},
  author = {Christian Bartolo Burlò and Adrian Francalanza and Alceste Scalas and Emilio Tuosto},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2404.19614},
  year   = {2024}
}

Comments

This preprint is the author version of the paper published at COORDINATION 2024

R2 v1 2026-06-28T16:11:36.895Z