The MADAG Strategy for Fault Location Techniques
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
This manuscript presents a technique for fault localization. The main contribution of this technique is reducing the size of the used test suite by prioritizing the test cases in the test suite based on the suspicious value of each test case. The proposed technique has been evaluated using 12 subject programs taken from SIR. the results showed that the proposed technique used about 9% and 14.5% of the given test cases without losing the effectiveness of the fault localization. The following issues are needed to improve the quality of this manuscript. 1- paragraph 2 on page 1 (statements 4 4 4 4 5 5 5 5 ) with figure 1 must move to section 2 preliminary. 2- test case consists of test input, output, and covered statements; therefore, using test inputs and test cases interchangeably confuses the reader. 3- rewrite the research questions on pages 3,13, and 14 because they are wordy. 4- in section 2.1, rewrite the statement "this concept was first mentioned by "who"? 5- in section 3.2, there is confusion in the first statement because the meaning is unclear. 6- in the algorithm, lines 8 and 15 T=T\ST unclear operation are you mean difference. You can clear this operation. Also, line 17 is unclear (rewrite). 7- in Figure 4, why t1 is p and t6 is f? 8-using gid is confusing. Can you write it group id? 8- in page 10, u write (4/6). Is it 4 out of 6 or what? 9- in page 11, equation 2 is formulated in the wrong way reduction ratio = all TC - selected TC)/ all test cases. The eq. in its current form represents the selection ratio. Therefore, you write smaller reduction indicates better results which contradicts the hypothesis of the manuscript. This equation must be reformulated, and the results in section 4.4 must be updated. 10- in page 15, the efficacy of the proposed technique is close to the others with the UNIX suite. And the most efficiency is in figure 8. a. 11- The results must support the conclusion..
Author Response
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Author Response File: 
Author Response.docx
Reviewer 2 Report
The author suggests the MADAG strategy to improve the fault localization technique. To prove the effectiveness of the strategy, it is compared with other prioritization techniques. Also, the overall experimental results prove the effectiveness of the MADAG strategy well.
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Reviewer 3 Report
This paper is about a test case prioritization/selection strategy, namely the Minimal Aggregate of the Diversity of All Groups (MADAG).
The approach aims to prioritize test cases before they are applied to the SBFL technique.
The approach is logical and the paper has sufficient detail.
I had difficult times to read the paper due to its structuring and used language.
Abstract: Restructure the sentence:
‘(1) MADAG strategy just uses only 8.99 and 14.27 test cases, 18 on average, from the Siemens and UNIX test-suite, respectively, to SBFL techniques with approximation effectiveness of fault localization to all test inputs and superior performance to the previously best test case prioritization methods;’
Language issues. Please revise the use of language for the following expressions:
I would not use the expression ‘the SBFL’; since you use it like a specific term.
I would not use the expression program statements’ suspicion; since statements is not a person.
Although … but
high-statement -coverage
we applying
effectiveness as when
as possible as fewer
etc.
Section 3.1 is too difficult to follow, due to the complexity of the used English language expressions.
Section 3.2 is hard to follow because it is explained at the level of abstraction of models of the test cases not at the level of actual programming language constructs.
I would present the real example first and explain the approach step by step accordingly.
The paper states as a future work that branches, functions, and predicates will be considered. These are the language expressions where program errors are experienced I guess more often.
Author Response
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Author Response File: Author Response.docx
Round 2
Reviewer 3 Report
I am happy to accept this paper.
