Backstop
About Backstop
In this project, we sought to create tools to help novice Java programmers comprehend some of the complicated error messages provided by the Java Virtual Machine. Whereas there has been much work in creating easy-to-understand compiler messages, little work has been done in the area of runtime errors. When a Java program produces an uncaught exception, the result is a stacktrace, which can be difficult for a novice programmer to understand. Backstop has been designed to produce a simpler error message that attempts to explain the cause of the problem, and how to fix it.
Our paper on Backstop has been published in the proceedings of SIGCSE 2008 and is available here.
Unfortunately the Backstop project is no longer active but if you are interested in working on it and reviving it, please contact us.
Team Members
Prof. Gail Kaiser, kaiser [at] cs.columbia.edu
Chris Murphy
Eunhee Kim
Links
Publications
Backstop paper from SIGCSE 2008
Tech report, with an appendix
Related Work
Jim Etheredge’s CMeRun paper
Download
Backstop is released under the GNU General Public License
Backstop: A Tool for Debugging Runtime Errors
Presented by Chris Murphy at the 39th SIGCSE technical symposium on computer science education on March 13, 2008
Backstop: A Tool for Debugging Runtime Errors
BibTexType = inproceedings
author = “Christian Murphy, Eunhee Kim, Gail Kaiser and Adam Cannon”,
title = “Backstop: A Tool for Debugging Runtime Errors”,
bootktile = “Proc. of the 39th SIGCSE technical symposium on computer science education”,
pages = “173-177”,
month = “March”,
year = “2008”
Parameterizing Random Test Data According to Equivalence Classes
Presented by Chris Murphy at the 2nd international workshop on random testing, co-located with ASE 2007 on November 6, 2007
Tools and Techniques for Designing and Evaluating Self-Healing Systems
Presented by Rean Griffith at AT&T Research on October 30, 2007
The Role of RAS-Models in the Design and Evaluation of Self-Healing Systems
Presented by Rean Griffith at the 3rd International Conference on Self-Organization and Autonomous Systems in Computing and Communications (SOAS) on Sept 26, 2007
RAS-Models: A Building Block for Self-Healing Benchmarks
Presented by Rean Griffith at the Eighth International Workshop on Performability Modeling of Computer and Communication Systems (PMCCS-8) on Sept 21, 2007
The Role of Reliability, Availability and Serviceability (RAS) Models in the Design and Evaluation of Self-Healing Systems
BibTexType = inproceedings
author = “Rean Griffith, Ritika Virmani and Gail Kaiser”,
title = “The Role of Reliability, Availability and Serviceability (RAS) Models in the Design and Evaluation of Self-Healing Systems”,
bootktile = “3rd International Conference on Self-Organization and Autonomous Systems in Computing and Communications”,
month = “September”, year = “2007”
An Approach to Software Testing of Machine Learning Applications
Presented by Chris Murphy at the 19th international conference on software engineering and knowledge engineering (SEKE) on July 11, 2007
Dynamic Emulation and Fault-Injection using Dyninst
Presented at Rean Griffith (student) during Paradyn/Condor Week at University of Wisconsin-Madison on April 30, 2007