at different phases of the software development process and, typically, researchers
working within each topic will form disjoint communities.
Figure 5 illustrates the SBSE-inspired relationship between requirements optimiza-
tion and regression testing. As a selection problem, the task of selecting requirements
is closely related to the problem of selecting test cases for regression testing. The
difference is that test cases have to cover code in order to achieve high fitness, whereas
requirements have to cover customer expectations. In the detail, there will be differ-
ences in these two forms of coverage, but as optimization problems, the similarity is
striking: both can be viewed as subset selection problems and also as set cover problems.
When one turns to the problem of prioritization, the similarity is also most striking.
Both regression test cases and requirements need to be prioritized. In requirement
analysis, we seek an order that will ensure that, should development be interrupted,
then maximum benefit will have been achieved for the customer at the least cost to the
developer, a classic multiobjective cost/benefit problem. For test cases, the prioritization
must seek to ensure that, should testing be stopped, then maximum achievement of
test objectives is achieved with minimum test effort.
This is an appealing aspect of SBSE. It has the potential to create links and bridges
between areas of SE that have grown apart over the years, but which submit to similar
analysis from the optimization point of view. Such relationships may lead to exciting
new opportunities for cross fertilization between disjoint research communities. These
opportunities are a compelling reason for the emergence of conferences and events
that focus on Search-Based SE. The approach clearly has the potential to cut across
traditional SE boundaries.
11. OVERLOOKED AND EMERGING AREAS
Some areas of SBSE activity have been considered briefly in the literature and then
appear to have been overlooked by subsequent research. This section highlights these
areas. That is, these are topics that have been addressed, shown promising results, but
which have attracted neither follow-on studies nor (relatively speaking) many citations.
Given the initially patchy nature of work on SBSE and the recent upsurge in interest
and activity, these potentially overlooked areas may be worthy of further study.
Furthermore, this survey comes at a time when SBSE research is becoming
widespread, but before it has become mainstream. It is too soon to know whether
some of the areas that have apparently hitherto been overlooked might not simply be
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