Domain Specific Languages for Executable Specifications

Abstract

In agile software development, acceptance test-driven development is sometimes mentioned, and some have explored the possibilities. This study investigates if a non-technical individual can write executable specifications based on domain specific languages from three different frameworks. Fit, which is an acceptance testing framework based on HTML forms, CubicTest which is an acceptance testing framework that uses modeling through Eclipse, and RSpec, a BDD framework for specifying system behavior through examples. This study involves an experiment where the perceived effectiveness and understandability of the three frameworks are evaluated. 10 students participated in a one and a half hour experiment for which they had prepared themselves for, by having one week to acquire overview of their assigned framework. The experiment was held in a computer laboratory at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology. After results were gathered and analyzed, statistical hypothesis testing was unfortunately not able to reject the null-hypothesis of the study. No conclusions could therefore be drawn. The results of the study are discussed and possible improvements and further work is mentioned.