What is the Heartbleed Bug? The Heartbleed bug is a recently identified bug in the OpenSSL security protocol toolkit. OpenSSL is widely used on web servers to encrypt user data.In general, software bugs are computer program error that cause the software to behave in an unexpected way (e.g., crash, produce a wrong output). Security bugs are aContinue reading “A Canadian Guide to the Heartbleed Bug”
Category Archives: Software Engineering
Interesting Quotes from AMD Canada Event
On March 7th of last year I attended an OCE event called the “AMD HSA and Heterogeneous Computing Research Showcase.” I recently came across my notes from the event and I thought a few quotes from the keynote speaker, Phil Rogers from AMD Canada, were worth sharing. Phil Rogers on AMD’s commitment to open industryContinue reading “Interesting Quotes from AMD Canada Event”
Empirical Methods Should Guide the Development of New Software Engineering Tools
The following quote is one of my favorite quotes regarding the right way to conduct Software Engineering (SE) research. It summarizes the importance of utilizing empirical methods to inspire and guide the development of new SE tools and techniques: “In all fields of SE, empirical methods should enable the development of scientific knowledge about howContinue reading “Empirical Methods Should Guide the Development of New Software Engineering Tools”
Predicting Mutation Scores
Last week my MSc student, Kevin Jalbert, presented his early thesis results at the Workshop on Realizing Artificial Intelligence Synergies in Software Engineering (RAISE 2012). The workshop took place in Zurich Switzerland and was colocated with ICSE 2012. The title of the presentation (and the paper that appears in the proceedings) was “Predicting Mutation Score Using SourceContinue reading “Predicting Mutation Scores”
The Importance of Incremental Research
Last year Bertrand Meyer authored a post titled Long Live Incremental Research! at BLOG@CACM. Rather then writing my own post on the topic, I instead want to encourage people to read Meyer’s post as I think he does a great job of summarizing the importance of approaching research incrementally and not aiming for the next great breakthrough. A few quotesContinue reading “The Importance of Incremental Research”
Static Analysis Tools for Concurrency
FindBugs – works on Java. In the list of bugs detected all of the “Multithreaded correctness” bugs are relevant to concurrency. Command-line interface or eclipse plugin (eclipse plugin update site:http://findbugs.cs.umd.edu/eclipse/) Lint – a UNIX tool for C JLint – a Java version of Lint that is available as stand alone or eclipse plugin (eclipse plugin update site:http://www.jutils.com/eclipse-update) ParasoftContinue reading “Static Analysis Tools for Concurrency”
Software Testing Tools for Concurrency
As the use of concurrency in software increases there are more software testing tools being developed in both industry an academia. Below is a fairly comprehensive list of tools (mainly for Java): ConTest – IBM concurrent testing tool that inserts random delays into Java bytecode ConAn – a thread testing tool for Java CHESS – a Microsoft toolContinue reading “Software Testing Tools for Concurrency”