What is a code mutator and how can it help me?
A code mutator is a program which changes (i.e., mutates) source code in a well-defined manner.  When MATmute is asked to mutate an .m file, it reads and parses parts of the target file and then generates new .m files which each contain one code mutation.  These .m files are known as mutants.

These mutants can be very useful for at least two reasons:

1. If a piece of software is being well tested then coding mistakes should be caught during the testing process.  Therefore, that same testing procedure should be able to detect (i.e., "kill") any mutants which contain mistakes.  However, if the testing procedure is unable to detect the difference between the original programs and the mutants then it illustrates a weakness in the testing procedure.  (In rare cases, a mutant may be functionally equivalent to the original program, and, in that case, there is no flaw in the mutant for the tests to detect.  However, functionally equivalent mutants are rare.)

2. It is likely that every non-trivial sample of code has some mistakes.  Ideally one would prefer to eliminate all of these mistakes, but because of the sheer amount of effort required to produce fully correct code that approach is not usually feasible.  Mutation testing allows the code developer to perform a sensitivity analysis on the code to quantify how certain classes of coding mistakes effect the accuracy of their program.

Why is MATmute targeted at computational scientists?
Code mutators have existed since the 1970s, but it has largely remain a research tool used by software engineers who are developing and evaluating testing methodologies for "traditional" software.  However, some researchers feel that mutation testing could be put to valuable use by computational scientists who are in desperate need of techniques to help them assess the quality of their code.


How does MATmute work?
MATmute consists of two main components.  A set of Python modules which are used to generate the mutant .m files, and some .m files which are used by MATLAB in order to run the generated mutants.

When the matmute command is called in MATLAB it calls the Python modules with the name of the .m file that is to be mutated.  The mutants are then generated and saved before control is passed back to the MATLAB function.  This function then uses the given tests to execute the mutants.  The ouputs from the tests run on the mutants are compared with the outputs from the tests run on the original code to measure the relative error that is introduced by the mutation.   The person who is testing the software may then decide to alter or augment their testing strategy by examining these results.

A similar procedure could be carried out by having a outside person (someone who is not the tester) introduce mistakes in the code to see if the tester is able to detect them.  However, MATmute automates this process is a way which is reproducible -- a feature that is particularly important in the context of computational science.