Dynamic program slicing methods

Abstract A dynamic program slice is that part of a program that “affects” the computation of a variable of interest during program execution on a specific program input. Dynamic program slicing refers to a collection of program slicing methods that are based on program execution and may significantly reduce the size of a program slice because run-time information, collected during program execution, is used to compute program slices. Dynamic program slicing was originally proposed only for program debugging, but its application has been extended to program comprehension, software testing, and software maintenance. Different types of dynamic program slices, together with algorithms to compute them, have been proposed in the literature. In this paper we present a classification of existing dynamic slicing methods and discuss the algorithms to compute dynamic slices. In the second part of the paper, we compare the existing methods of dynamic slice computation.

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