State of the Practice in Algorithmic Debugging

Algorithmic debugging is a semi-automatic debugging technique which is based on the answers of an oracle (usually the programmer) to a series of questions generated automatically by the algorithmic debugger. The technique typically traverses a record of the execution—the so-called execution tree—which only captures the declarative aspects of the execution and hides operational details. In this work we review and compare the most important algorithmic debuggers of different programming paradigms. In the study we analyze the features incorporated by current algorithmic debuggers, and we identify some features not supported yet by any debugger. We then compare all the debuggers giving rise to a map of the state of the practice in algorithmic debugging.