Apply Mutation Testing

Dextool mutate requires a compile_commands.json for its analyzer. Such a file contains how each file that the project consist of is compiled. These flags are extracted by dextool from compile_commands.json in order to analyze the source code for mutants. Some build systems can produce such a json file natively (cmake) while others can be inspected with BEAR.

You can follow the instruction below

GoogleTest Example

Google Test project is used as an example.

Obtain the project you want to analyze

git clone https://github.com/google/googletest.git
cd googletest

Generate a JSON compilation database for the project

mkdir build
pushd build
cmake -DCMAKE_EXPORT_COMPILE_COMMANDS=ON -Dgtest_build_tests=ON -Dgmock_build_tests=ON ..
make
popd

Create a configuration file

dextool mutate admin --init

The file should be pretty self explaining. Open the config file and change the following fields:

[workarea]
include = ["googlemock/include/*", "googlemock/src/*", "googletest/include/*", "googletest/src/*"]

[compiler]
extra_flags = [ "-D_POSIX_PATH_MAX=1024" ]

[compile_commands]
search_paths = ["./build/compile_commands.json"]

[mutant_test]
test_cmd = "./test.sh"
#test_cmd_dir = ["./build/test"]
build_cmd = "./build.sh"
analyze_using_builtin = ["gtest"]

Generate a database of containing the mutants

dextool mutate analyze

Create a file build.sh that will build the subject under test when invoked:

#!/bin/bash
set -e
cd build
make -j$(nproc)

Create a file test.sh that will run the entire test suite when invoked:

#!/bin/bash
set -e
cd build
ctest --output-on-failure

Make the files executable so they can be used by dextool:

chmod 755 build.sh test.sh

Run the mutation testing on the LCR mutants

dextool mutate test