ISSTA 2025
Wed 25 - Sat 28 June 2025 Trondheim, Norway
co-located with FSE 2025
Wed 25 Jun 2025 16:25 - 16:50 at Aurora B - Database Testing Chair(s): Alberto Martin-Lopez

Relational Database Management Systems (DBMSs) utilize transactions to ensure data consistency and integrity, while providing multiple isolation levels to strike a balance between consistency and performance. However, isolation anomalies in relational DBMSs can undermine their claimed isolation levels, and lead to severe consequences, e.g., incorrect query results and database states. Existing isolation checkers can only work on simple π‘˜π‘’π‘¦-π‘£π‘Žπ‘™π‘’π‘’-like data models and the associated π‘Ÿπ‘’π‘Žπ‘‘ (π‘˜π‘’π‘¦) and π‘€π‘Ÿπ‘–π‘‘π‘’ (π‘˜π‘’π‘¦, π‘£π‘Žπ‘™π‘’π‘’) operations. Therefore, they cannot be directly applied to relational DBMSs that support relational data models and complex SQL operations. In this paper, we propose a novel black-box Isolation checker for Relational DBMSs, IsoRel, which can support relational data models and complex SQL operations. To infer dependencies among transactions in relational DBMSs, we first design an isolation-agnostic SQL instrumentation approach to record the data rows accessed by each SQL statement by utilizing two auxiliary columns in each database table. We then utilize the recorded data rows of each SQL statement to construct a transaction dependency graph for relational transactions, and identify isolation anomalies based on anomaly patterns. We evaluate IsoRel on five widely-used relational DBMSs, i.e., MySQL, PostgreSQL, MariaDB, CockroachDB, and TiDB, and all their supported isolation levels. Our evaluation reveals a total of 48 unique isolation anomalies that violate the isolation levels defined by Adya.

Wed 25 Jun

Displayed time zone: Amsterdam, Berlin, Bern, Rome, Stockholm, Vienna change

16:00 - 17:15
Database TestingResearch Papers at Aurora B
Chair(s): Alberto Martin-Lopez Software Institute - USI, Lugano
16:00
25m
Talk
QTRAN: Extending Metamorphic-Oracle based Logical Bug Detection Techniques for Multiple-DBMS Dialect Support
Research Papers
Li Lin Xiamen University, Qinglin Zhu School of Informatics, Xiamen University, Hongqiao Chen School of Informatics, Xiamen University, Zhuangda Wang Xiamen University, Rongxin Wu Xiamen University, Xiaoheng Xie Ant Group
DOI
16:25
25m
Talk
Detecting Isolation Anomalies in Relational DBMSs
Research Papers
Rui Yang Institute of Software, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Ziyu Cui Institute of Software at Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wensheng Dou Institute of Software Chinese Academy of Sciences, Yu Gao Institute of Software at Chinese Academy of Sciences; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Jiansen Song Institute of Software at Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xudong Xie Institute of Software Chinese Academy of Sciences, China, Jun Wei Institute of Software at Chinese Academy of Sciences; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences
DOI
16:50
25m
Talk
Understanding Practitioners’ Expectations on Clear Code Review Comments
Research Papers
Junkai Chen Singapore Management University, Singapore, Zhenhao Li York University, Qiheng Mao Zhejiang University, Xing Hu Zhejiang University, Kui Liu Huawei, Xin Xia Zhejiang University
DOI

Information for Participants
Wed 25 Jun 2025 16:00 - 17:15 at Aurora B - Database Testing Chair(s): Alberto Martin-Lopez
Info for room Aurora B:

Aurora B is the second room in the Aurora wing.

When facing the main Cosmos Hall, access to the Aurora wing is on the right, close to the side entrance of the hotel.

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