Mining Parametric State-Based Specifications from Executions

This paper presents an approach to mine parametric state-based specifications from execution traces, which can involve multiple components. We first discuss a general framework for mining parametric properties from execution traces, which allows one to apply non-parametric mining algorithms to infer parametric specifications without any modification. Then we propose a novel mining algorithm that extends the Probabilistic Finite State Automata (PFSA) approach to infer finite automata that describe system behaviors concisely and precisely from successful executions. The presented technique has been implemented in a prototype tool for Java, called jMiner, which has been applied to a number of real-life programs, including Java library classes and popular open source packages. Our experiments generated many meaningful specifications and revealed problematic behaviors in some programs, showing the effectiveness of our approach.

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