Multi-Level Testing Approach for Multi-Agent Systems

Abstract

The software development cycles need product testing. There is a crucial lack in testing phases of multi-agent systems. To this end, a call for an investigation of appropriate testing techniques is necessary to provide adequate software development processes and supporting tools. Among all existing solutions of the test, the model-based testing technique –MBT) has gained attention with the popularization of models both in software design and development. This technique uses a so-called abstract test model to generate abstract test cases. After their concretization, concrete test cases are submitted to the system under test. The systems outputs are finally compared to the abstract test model expected results. In this context, a model-based testing approach for multi-agent systems based on the Reference net paradigm is proposed in this paper. A running example supported by a multi-agent testing prototype, which aims at simplifying and providing a uniform and automated way for multi-agent systems testing is presented and discussed.