XML configuration files are widely-used to specify the user interfaces (UI) of Android apps. Configuration compatibility (CC) issues are induced owing to the inconsistent handling of such XML configuration files across different Android framework versions. CC issues can cause software crashes and inconsistent look-and-feels, severely impacting the user experience of Android apps. However, there is no universal solution to resolve CC issues and app developers need to handle CC issues case by case. Existing tools are designed based on predefined rules or visual features that are possibly manifested by CC issues. Unfortunately, they can fail or generate overfitting patches when the CC issues are beyond their capabilities. To fill the above research gaps, we first empirically studied the app developers' common strategies in patching real-world CC issues. Based on the findings, we propose ConfFix, an automatic approach to repair CC issues in Android apps. ConfFix is driven by the knowledge of how an XML element is handled inconsistently in different versions of the Android framework and generates patches to eliminate such inconsistencies. We evaluated ConfFix on a set of 77 reproducible CC issues in 13 open-source Android apps. The results show that ConfFix outperforms baselines in successfully repairing 64 CC issues with a high precision. Encouragingly, the patches for 38 CC issues have been confirmed and merged by app developers.

Tue 18 Jul

Displayed time zone: Pacific Time (US & Canada) change

10:30 - 12:00
ISSTA 1: Program Repair and DebuggingTechnical Papers at Amazon Auditorium (Gates G20)
Chair(s): Andreas Zeller CISPA Helmholtz Center for Information Security
10:30
15m
Talk
Improving Spectrum-Based Localization of Multiple Faults by Iterative Test Suite Reduction
Technical Papers
Dylan Callaghan Stellenbosch University, Bernd Fischer Stellenbosch University
DOI
10:45
15m
Talk
A Bayesian Framework for Automated Debugging
Technical Papers
Sungmin Kang KAIST, Wonkeun Choi KAIST, Shin Yoo KAIST
DOI Pre-print
11:00
15m
Talk
ConfFix: Repairing Configuration Compatibility Issues in Android Apps
Technical Papers
Huaxun Huang Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Chi Xu The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Ming Wen Huazhong University of Science and Technology, Yepang Liu Southern University of Science and Technology, Shing-Chi Cheung Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
DOI
11:15
15m
Talk
Quantitative Policy Repair for Access Control on the Cloud
Technical Papers
William Eiers University of California at Santa Barbara, Ganesh Sankaran University of California at Santa Barbara, Tevfik Bultan University of California at Santa Barbara
DOI
11:30
15m
Talk
Automated Program Repair from Fuzzing Perspective
Technical Papers
YoungJae Kim Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology, Seungheon Han Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology, Askar Yeltayuly Khamit Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology, Jooyong Yi UNIST (Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology)
DOI