System and method of test iteration via property chaining

A test system for conducting stress testing of a system under test, including:

• A test harness coupleable to the system under test;
• and
• A test sequence processor that:
• bounds a set of test commands with a transitory iterator command and a transitory iteration-verifier command, wherein the commands are passed to a test harness that is coupled to a system under test and the test commands are expressed in a declarative command language;
• wherein the transitory iterator command and the transitory iteration-verifier command are active when they are executed and are inactive when the bounded test commands are active;
• performs a sequence of network traffic stress tests in which test commands cause the test harness to send test traffic messages to the system under test via one or more network ports and measure performance of the system under test;
• wherein the transitory iterator and iteration-verifier commands combine to implement a stability backoff test of stress levels;
• begins in an expected failure range that is above an approximately measured pass/fail threshold;
• the transitory iterator command backing off an applied stress applied by the bounded test commands;
• repeats the applied stress a predetermined number of times, which is more than once for the applied stress level;
• the iteration-verifier command, evaluating a pass/fail result for the iteration of the applied stress level, and accumulating a pass/fail rate for results of iterations at the applied stress level;
• and
• evaluates the accumulated pass/fail rate, after the predetermined number of times iterating at the applied stress level, against a predetermined pass rate, and scoring the applied stress level as passed or failed;
• the transitory iterator command terminating the test when the predetermined pass rate has been achieved at a predetermined number of applied stress levels as the transitory iterator progressively backs off the applied stress level;
• and
• one or more result commands outside the bounded test commands reporting test results.

A tangible non-volatile computer readable medium that stores computer instructions that, when run on hardware, implement a stress test of a system under test, the implementation including:

• bounding a set of test commands with a transitory iterator command and a transitory iteration-verifier command, wherein the commands are passed to a test harness that is coupled to a system under test and the test commands are expressed in a declarative command language;
• wherein the transitory iterator command and the transitory iteration-verifier command are active when they are executed and are inactive when the bounded test commands are active;
• performing a sequence of network traffic stress tests in which test commands cause the test harness to send test traffic messages to the system under test via one or more network ports and measure performance of the system under test;
• wherein the transitory iterator and iteration-verifier commands combine to implement a stability backoff test of stress levels;
• beginning in an expected failure range that is above an approximately measured pass/fail threshold;
• the transitory iterator command backing off an applied stress applied by the bounded test commands;
• repeating the applied stress a predetermined number of times, which is more than once for the applied stress level;
• the iteration-verifier command, evaluating a pass/fail result for the iteration of the applied stress level, and accumulating a pass/fail rate for results of iterations at the applied stress level;
• and
• evaluating the accumulated pass/fail rate, after the predetermined number of times iterating at the applied stress level, against a predetermined pass rate, and scoring the applied stress level as passed or failed;
• the transitory iterator command terminating the test when the predetermined pass rate has been achieved at a predetermined number of applied stress levels as the transitory iterator progressively backs off the applied stress level;
• and
• one or more result commands outside the bounded test commands reporting test results.