  Software Energy Consumption(SEC) is gaining more and more attention. In this
paper, we tackle the problem of hinting developers about the SEC of their
programs in the context of software developments based on Continuous
Integration(CI). In this study, we investigate if the CI can leverage
developers' tests to perform a new class of tests: the energy regression
testing. Energy regression is similar to performance regression but focused on
the energy consumption of the program instead of standard performance
indicators, like execution time or memory consumption. We propose to perform an
exploratory study of the usage of developers' tests for energy regression
testing. We propose to first investigate if developers' tests can be used to
obtain stable SEC indicators. Then, to consider if comparing the SEC of
developers' tests between two versions can accurately spot energy regressions
introduced by automated program mutations. Finally, to assess if it can
successfully pinpoint the source code lines guilty of energy regressions. Our
study will pave the way for automated SEC regression tools that can be readily
deployed inside an existing CI infrastructure to raise awareness of SEC issues
among practitioners.
