TERTS: um tutor de ensino para refatoração de test smells

Abstract

Teaching test smell refactoring is a challenging practice that requires a combination of theoretical and practical knowledge in the academic context. To achieve this, it is essential to provide technology students with the appropriate tools and methodologies to efficiently identify, understand, and correct test smells. This work presents TERTS, a teaching tutor for test smell refactoring developed for technology students on a web platform. The tool offers a set of unit test exercises in the Java language, allowing students to enhance their skills in test smell refactoring. The validation of TERTS was conducted based on the Technology Acceptance Model (TAM), involving 16 participants from technology courses at the Federal University of Ceará - Quixadá Campus. The validation included measuring (i) Tool usefulness, (ii) Ease of use, (iii) Intention of future use, (iv) Skills acquired after using TERTS, and (v) Students’ level of knowledge about test smell refactoring before and after using the tool. The results indicate that TERTS is easy to use and effective in educating about test smells, addressing both simple and complex cases, and promoting essential knowledge for unit test quality. Additionally, the tool plays an important role in consolidating knowledge, offering an accessible foundation for both beginners and those with experience in test smell refactoring. These findings suggest that TERTS is a promising tool for implementation in the educational environment.