Towards an Approach for Applying Early Testing to Smart Contracts

Abstract

Immutability - the ability for a Blockchain (BC) Ledger to remain an unalterable, permanent and indelible \nhistory of transactions - is a feature that is highlighted as a key benefit of BC. This ability is very important \nwhen several companies work collaboratively to achieve common objectives. This collaboration is usually \nrepresented by using business process models. BC is considered as a suitable technology to reduce the \ncomplexity of designing these collaborative processes using Smart Contracts. This paper discusses how to \ncombine Model-based Software Development, modelling techniques, such as use cases models and activity \ndiagram models based on Unified Model Languages (UML) in order to simplify and improve the modelling, \nmanagement and execution of collaborative business processes between multiple companies in the BC \nnetwork. This paper includes the neccessity of using transformation protocols to obtain Smart Contract code. \nIn addition, it presents systematic mechanisms to evaluate and validate Smart Contract, applying early testing \ntechniques, before deploying the Smart Contract code in the BC network.