Automatic test case generation from requirements for industrial cyber-physical systems

Abstract Industrial cyber-physical systems require complex software to orchestrate heterogeneous mechatronic components and control physical processes. This software is typically developed and refined iteratively in a model-driven fashion. Testing such multi-dimensional systems is extremely difficult as subsequent refinements may not correspond accurately with previous system models. We propose a framework to generate test-cases from functional requirements at all stages in the model-driven engineering process. A requirements ontology initially created during requirements engineering is iteratively refined such that test-cases can be generated automatically. An industrial water process system case study illustrates the strengths of the proposed formalism. We also present an automatic test-case generation and execution tool called REBATE (REquirements Based Automatic Testing Engine).