This article discusses the calculation of test-cases for interactive systems. A novel approach is presented that treats the problem of test-case synthesis as a formal abstraction problem. It is shown that test-cases can be viewed as formal contracts and that such test-cases are in fact abstractions of requirements specifications. The refinement calculus of Back and von Wright is used to formulate abstraction rules for calculating correct test-cases from a formal specification. The advantage of this abstraction approach is that simple input-output test-cases, as well as testing scenarios can be handled. Furthermore, different testing strategies like partition testing and mutation testing can be formulated in one theory.

testing, test-case generation, formal methods, refinement calculus