Why don't we let ChatGPT run the country? https://chatgpt.com/share/68c91b73-2b70-800c-874a-89d3179d1e09

25 years of delta debugging! On this day in 2000, I presented “Simplifying Failure-Inducing Inputs” at ISSTA - now one of the most influential works in the 50-year history of Transactions on Software Engineering. Read all about its genesis and impact at […] [Original post on mastodon.social]

Always use these six sentences in your paper rebuttal

How can you teach a machine how a program behaves? In our newest ACM TOSEM paper with Tural Mammadov, Dietrich Klakow, and Alexander Koller, we train machine learners from input/output pairs of thousands of program runs, producing models that _predict inputs […] [Original post on mastodon.social]

I'm happy to report that I got an ERC Proof of Concept grant from the European Research Council! In the PROSA project, we address a weak point of LLMs: understanding and predicting how code actually behaves. We train _program-specific models_ from myriads of synthesized executions, obtaining […]

Since its release two weeks ago, our #fandango test generator has been downloaded and installed more than 25,000 times! (Hint: It's "pip install fandango-fuzzer") Check it out here: https://fandango-fuzzer.github.io/

How reliable are citation metrics? According to Google Scholar, our 2025 paper "A Retrospective on Mining Version Histories to Guide Software Changes" (https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/abstract/document/10854513) has had its first citation in 1974 – 50 years […] [Original post on mastodon.social]

Introducing #Fandango 💃 — a powerful bio-inspired test generator designed to supercharge your software testing. Fandango gives you unprecedented control over test inputs, integrating grammars, constraints, and Python. Now with protocol testing! ➡️ Check out […] [Original post on mastodon.social]

Today at #fse2025: * 14:40 @ Cosmos 3C “Expressing and Checking Statistical Assumptions”: 84% of surveyed notebooks violate assumptions: https://conf.researchr.org/details/fse-2025/fse-2025-research-papers/93/Expressing-and-Checking-Statistical-Assumptions OR * 14:50 at Pirsenteret “jAST […]

My #fandango team at #fse2025 / #issta2025: Alexi Turcotte, Marius Smytzek, me, Pepe Zamudio, and Laura Plein. What is #Fandango? Watch this space on Thursday for our big 1.0 release announcement and/or attend Pepe‘s presentation on Friday 16:00!

Today at #fse2025: Check out * 14:20 @ Cosmos 3C: Bernd‘s journal-first work on Information Flow Fuzzing: https://conf.researchr.org/details/fse-2025/fse-2025-journal-first/31/Presentation-Proposal-for-Finding-Information-Leaks-with-Information-Flow-Fuzzing and * 15:12 @ Vega: Laura‘s Student […]

For the first time in 25 years, I put a sticker on my laptop

@richardseidl has conducted an extensive interview on fuzzing and our latest research work. Now with video and English subtitles: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u84xKFdrTzk

Knowing the input language of a software system greatly facilitates its (automated) testing. In our new GDBMiner work, we use the GNU debugger (GDB) to extract precise input grammars from any recursive descent parser that can be traced via GDB: https://doi.org/10.4230/LITES.10.1.1

Occasionally, I get a reviewer complaining, “You don’t compare against any other approach. So how can we know you’re better?” So I found a simple way to still add the "bold number column" that apparently everybody wants these days.

Fun fact: Of my nine papers that got a long-term impact award, none got a “best paper” award when they were published - and conversely, none of my “best paper”-awarded papers got an impact award later. Is this a common phenomenon?

Honors! Today at #icse2025, I received the #acm #sigsoft Influential Educator Award “for significant contributions and important innovations in automated software engineering education” (such as https://fuzzingbook.org). Thanks to all!

In today's #ast2025 keynote on our new #fandango fuzzer, I presented ongoing extensions for protocol fuzzing, oracle checking, coverage guidance, much more. Slides now available: https://conf.researchr.org/details/ast-2025/ast-2025-papers/17/Personalized-Fuzzing

If you want to meet me at #icse2025, find me * at my AST keynote: Mon 9am, Room 211 https://conf.researchr.org/details/ast-2025/ast-2025-papers/17/Personalized-Fuzzing * at the SBFT keynote: Tue 9am, Room 104 * at the ACM Awards session: Wed 4pm, plenary * at the 50 years of TSE session: Thu […]

On my way to #icse2025 in Ottawa 🇨🇦It took me 40 years to discover that Frankfurt airport has a visitor‘s terrace!

Double feature! The newest Transactions on Software Engineering features retrospectives on the most influential papers published in the journal’s first 40 years. Check out our takes on * Mining Software Repositories […] [Original post on mastodon.social]

What do you get if you combine #grammars, #constraints, #evolutionary algorithms, and #Python in one? A mighty fuzzer! Check out our latest #FANDANGO work, to appear at #ISSTA2025 […] [Original post on mastodon.social]

Big congrats to my students Tim Scheckenbach and Alexander Liggesmeyer, who just won Saarland University awards for their excellent BSc and MSc degrees!

Last week, I created my second start-up! InputLab GmbH (co-founded with Stanimir Iglev and Dominic Steinhöfel @dsteinhoefel) synthesizes complex test data from XML and JSON schemas to thoroughly test your enterprise application. Check it out at https://inputlab.net (in German)

And here we have a podcast in English, again on automated testing and fuzzing, recorded by the excellent #scilux team: https://www.scilux.eu/episodes/fuzzing-testing

The last weeks have been very busy, so catching up: My work on fuzzing has been featured on @detektorfm detektor.fm (in German): https://detektor.fm/wissen/forschungsquartett-wie-fuzzing-sicherheitsluecken-findet Enjoy!

Want security in research? And research in security? Actually, why not have both? "In view of the current geopolitical landscape", #cispa has opened a new round of faculty positions, including CySec, SE, ML, theory […]

Hint: When bidding for papers to review in #hotcrp, you can use the "search" function for topics you want to exclude

On my way to Cordoba, Argentina, speaking about personalized fuzzing at #facas2025 https://sites.google.com/view/facas2025/ and the #rio2025 Summer School https://rio2025.dc.exa.unrc.edu.ar

Last year, many airport e-gates abroad would suddenly deny me immigration because my printed name “DR. ZELLER” on my 2023 passport didn’t match its “ZELLER” electronic “name” field. So I paid 70€ to get a “fixed” 2025 passport with a new separate “title” field.

On my way to Karlsruhe Institute of Technology @kitcybersec.bsky.social , giving a talk on „Personalized Fuzzing“ https://cybersec.kcist.kit.edu/661.php

"You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards."

Yesterday, I gave a commencement speech for the graduates of #passau University. "The virtue of simplicity" reflected on the role of simplicity in science, both personal and universal, and how it is important for the future career of graduates. Enjoy! […]

Happy and honored to receive the 2025 ACM @SIGSOFT Influential Educator Award "For significant contributions and important innovations in automated software engineering education.“ The citation refers to my work on interactive textbooks such as @TheFuzzingBook https://fuzzingbook.org and […]

Congratulations to the new @ACM Fellows of 2024, including Satish Chandra, Marsha Chechik, @herrdreyer Derek Dreyer, @timmenzies Tim Menzies, Mira Mezini, @Bashar Bashar Nuseibeh, Abhik Roychoudhury, and Ben Zorn. What a great year this is!

First picture of the new #cispa building! The inner circle alone has a diameter of 100 meters. https://www.saarbruecker-zeitung.de/saarland/saar-pfalz-kreis/sanktingbert/cispa-neubau-als-topthema-bei-neujahrsempfang-in-st-ingbert_aid-123085571?share=8754c396ebe9e28858edc291f38e8a9e

#cispa gets a new 350M€ building in St. Ingbert, bringing all its researchers under one roof. There’s space for over 1,000 employees! https://cispa.de/en/new-cispa-building-in-igb

My student Björn Mathis passed his PhD exam today! In his work, he developed new methods for fuzzing and analyzing parsers, mining input grammars, and more: https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=ePl_ZAoAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao

My student Max (of GDBFuzz fame) passed his PhD exam today and will henceforth be known as Dr. Eisele. Congratulations!

Today, I was formally introduced as a new member of the prestigious #academia #europeana, the Scientific Academy of Europe. I felt humbled in the presence of Nobel laureates and so many most excellent scientists! https://www.ae-info.org

On my way to beautiful #wroclaw, Poland, visiting #buildingbridges2024 https://www.ae-info.org/ae/Acad_Main/News/News2/Building%20Bridges%202024

In 2000, Rob Pike said "Systems Software Research is irrelevant", criticizing three trends: 1. Don’t build, measure. (Phenomenology, not new things.) 2. Don’t go for breadth, go for depth. (Microspecialization, not systems.) 3. Take an existing thing and tweak it. How is LLM research […]

Still shocked and now looking for new opportunities? At #cispa, we have opened a new call for Tenured Faculty in Information Security, AI, or related areas (such as Software Engineering and Program Analysis), with super-generous funding. Apply now! https://career.cispa.de/tenured-faculty.html

Today at the #ase2024 poster sessions, learn how we use #isla to automatically solve Web form constraints for efficient Web fuzzing (w/ Björn Karthein). Paper is here: https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3691620.3695600

Today 5:20pm at #ase2024 - FixKit, a collection of five program repair approaches for Python programs. Find the paper here: https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3691620.3695347

On my way to #ase2024, the #lufthansa flight crew went the extra mile to make me celebrate my birthday