A method for testing and validating executable statechart modelsA method for testing and validating executable statechart models Peer-Reviewed Journal Publication Δημοσίευση σε Περιοδικό με Κριτές 2019-09-032019enStatecharts constitute an executable language for modelling event-based reactive systems. The essential complexity of statechart models solicits the need for advanced model testing and validation techniques. In this article, we propose a method aimed at enhancing statechart design with a range of techniques that have proven their usefulness to increase the quality and reliability of source code. The method is accompanied by a process that flexibly accommodates testing and validation techniques such as test-driven development, behaviour-driven development, design by contract, and property statecharts that check for violations of behavioural properties during statechart execution. The method is supported by the Sismic tool, an open-source statechart interpreter library in Python, which supports all the aforementioned techniques. Based on this tooling, we carry out a controlled user study to evaluate the feasibility, usefulness and adequacy of the proposed techniques for statechart testing and validation.http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/Software and Systems Modeling182837–863Mens_et_al_Softw. Syst. Model_18(2)_2019.pdfChania [Greece]Library of TUC2019-09-02application/pdf3.4 MBfree Mens Tom Decan Alexandre Spanoudakis Nikolaos Σπανουδακης Νικολαος Springer Statechart Executable modeling Behaviour-driven development Design by contract Runtime verification