Pre-trained Model-based Software Defect Prediction for Edge-cloud Systems

Abstract

Edge-cloud computing is a distributed computing infrastructure that brings computation and data storage with low latency closer to clients. As interest in edge-cloud systems grows, research on testing the systems has also been actively studied. However, as with traditional systems, the amount of resources for testing is always limited. Thus, we suggest a function-level just-in-time (JIT) software defect prediction (SDP) model based on a pre-trained model to address the limitation by prioritizing the limited testing resources for the defect-prone functions. The pre-trained model is a transformer-based deep learning model trained on a large corpus of code snippets, and the fine-tuned pre-trained model can provide the defect proneness for the changed functions at a commit level. We evaluate the performance of the three popular pre-trained models (i.e., CodeBERT, GraphCodeBERT, UniXCoder) on edge-cloud systems in within-project and cross-project environments. To the best of our knowledge, it is the first attempt to analyse the performance of the three pre-trained model-based SDP models for edge-cloud systems. As a result, we can confirm that UniXCoder showed the best performance among the three in the WPDP environment. However, we also confirm that additional research is necessary to apply the SDP models to the CPDP environment.