Abstract:
This paper reports on an empirical study involving end users that addresses the question of whether it is possible to provide the benefits of formal testing within the informal spreadsheet paradigm. We have developed a "What You See Is What You Test" (WYSIWYT) methodology that brings the benefits of formal testing in a way that does not require the users to learn the underlying software engineering theory about testing. Our WYSIWYT methodology attempts to do this by supplementing the immediate visual feedback about the values in cells with feedback about their "testedness". A previous controlled experiment using computer science students showed that the subjects who used the methodology were significantly more effective and more efficient in their testing and significantly less overconfident about the correctness of their spreadsheets than subjects who did not use the methodology. The results were obtained without providing any training in the theory of testing or test adequacy that the methodology implements. In this paper we report the results of a similar experiment that investigated whether spreadsheet end users with little or no programming experience would obtain the same benefits using the methodology.
