News

Paper accepted at EASE 2026

01.04.2026

We are happy to share that our paper Quality-Driven Selective Mutation for Deep Learning by Zaheed Ahmed, Emmanuel Charleson Dapaah, Philip Makedonski and Jens Grabowski has been accepted at the 30th International Conference on Evaluation and Assessment in Software Engineering (EASE 2026). The conference will take place from 9 to 12 June 2026 in Glasgow, United Kingdom. This study presents a probabilistic framework for quantifying mutant quality along two complementary dimensions: resistance and realism. The framework enables the ranking and filtering of low-quality mutation-operator configurations, substantially reducing mutation cost while preserving the practical value of mutants for testing and debugging.

Paper accepted at JAWs 2026

01.04.2026

We are pleased to announce that our paper titled Learning Model Mutations from Faults in Deep Learning by Zaheed Ahmed, Philip Makedonski and Jens Grabowski has been accepted for presentation at the Journal Ahead Workshop (JAWs 2026), part of the 48th International Conference on Software Engineering (ICSE 2026). As part of the acceptance, we received an invitation to submit an extended version of the paper to either ACM TOSEM or IEEE TSE within six months of the event. The conference will take place from 12 to 18 April 2026 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Paper accepted at HCII 2026

19.12.2025

We are pleased to announce that a paper from our research group has been accepted at the 28th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction (HCII 2026). This year’s conference will take place from July 26th to 31st in Montreal, Canada. Our accepted paper is:

From Promise to Proof: Assessing Replicability and Reproducibility in Interaction-Based Emotion Recognition Research by Carina Bieber, Patrick Harms, and Jens Grabowski

Paper accepted at SAM 2025

02.10.2025

We are happy to announce that our paper Model-Driven Root Cause Analysis for Trustworthy AI: A Data-and-Model-Centric Explanation Framework (by Emmanuel Charleson Dapaah and Jens Grabowski) has been accepted at the The 17th System Analysis and Modelling conference (SAM 2025). This paper presents a model-driven Root Cause Analysis framework that explains ML pipeline performance by attributing outcomes to interpretable factors spanning both data complexity and model configuration. Paper accepted at SAM 2025.

Latest TDL specifications published

14.08.2025

ETSI’s Methods for Testing and Specification (MTS) committee has published an update of its TDL specifications. These specifications are:
The outcomes of our continued work on the Test Description Language (TDL) within TTF T034 of the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) have been published as updated versions of the specifications:

You can find the complete series of TDL specifications here.

Paper accepted at LOD 2025

25.04.2025

We are happy to announce that our paper Empirical Evidence for Data-Centric AI: A Comparative Study of Data Complexity and Hyperparameter Effects (by Emmanuel Charleson Dapaah and Jens Grabowski) has been accepted at the The 11th International Conference on Machine Learning, Optimization, and Data Science (LOD 2025). This paper presents a comprehensive empirical study comparing the relative influence of dataset complexity and hyperparameter settings on the performance of five widely-used classification algorithms: Random Forest, Support Vector Machine, Decision Tree, Adaptive Boosting, and Multi-Layer Perceptron. The findings reveal that data-centric factors—especially class overlap (N1)—consistently exert a far stronger impact on both bias and variance than hyperparameter settings.

New TTF for TDL Maintenance

03.03.2025

Dr. Philip Makedonski will be part of a new Testing Task Force (TTF) of the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) for the maintenance and evolution of the Test Description Language (TDL). Details on the project can be found here: Enhancing TDL and TOP to Meet Users’ New Demands (TTF T045).

Poster accepted at HCII 2025

19.02.2025

We are pleased to announce that a poster from our research group has been accepted at the 27th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction (HCII 2025). This year’s conference will take place from June 22nd to 27th in Gothenburg, Sweden. Our accepted poster is:

Evaluation of Data Sharing in Interaction-Based Emotion Recognition Research by Carina Bieber, Patrick Harms, and Jens Grabowski

ETSI TR 103 910 Published

15.02.2025

We are pleased to announce that ETSI TR 103 910 has been published. Driven by Fraunhofer FOKUS with contributions from our group and other partners, it provides a procedural understanding of testing ML-based systems, including principles and challenges for testing ML-based systems, quality criteria and test items, as well as suitable test methods and their integration into the life cycle of typical ML-based applications.

Journal First Presentation at ICST 2025

16.12.2024

We are happy to announce that we will present the findings of our journal article A new perspective on the competent programmer hypothesis through the reproduction of real faults with repeated mutations at the 18th IEEE International Conference on Software Testing, Verification and Validation (ICST) 2025. Within the article, we explore the competent programmer hypothesis by examining the connection between mutation testing and real-world faults. Through mutation chains, we assess the directness of this connection by recreating faults. The presentation will be part of the Journal-First Papers track of the conference.

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