Mutant generator for C-like languages
Jamie Andrews
May, 2005

General comments:
- There are really two executables:
  - "descmutants", a Prolog program that just generates mutant
    descriptions.  It's a simple filter that is invoked by
    generateMutants.sh, so you don't have to invoke it directly.
  - "generateMutants.sh", a shell script that takes the mutant
    descriptions and actually generates the mutant source files.
- There is a test program for you to generate mutants for,
  "wc.c", a simple word-counting program.

To compile:
- You will need to have or to install SWI-Prolog.  SWI-Prolog is
  arguably the best and most popular open-source Prolog.  The
  program will probably work with other Prologs, but you'll have
  to figure out the proper incantation to put in the Makefile
  and you might have to make some minor tweaks to the source.
- Put the SWI-Prolog compiler "pl" on your path.
- Type "make" and you should get an executable called "descmutants".
- Put that executable somewhere on your path or just leave it in
  the directory where you are making the mutants.

To generate mutants:
- Make sure that the "descmutants" executable and the
  "generateMutants.sh" shell script are in your path (or, just
  in the directory where you are making the mutants).
- Type "generateMutants.sh <sourcefile>", where <sourcefile> is
  the name of your program (in a C-like language) that you want
  to generate mutants for.

Caveats:
- The mutant generator is very stupid.  It just generates
  mutants on a line-by-line basis.  It can't distinguish
  declarations from statements.
- As a result, some of the mutants are UNCOMPILABLE.  You will
  have to try to compile them yourself, and always account for
  the special case in which mutant number X doesn't have a
  compiled version.
- Some of the mutants will also be equivalent to the original.
  I feel less guilty about those because we can't eliminate them
  automatically!
- Previous experience indicates that about 10% of the mutants
  are uncompilable and about 10-15% are equivalent.

Good luck and let me know if you have any problems.

--Jamie Andrews.
  andrews    .uwo        } Merge these two lines to obtain my e-mail address.
         @csd    .ca     }