The paper introduces LLM-EBG, an evolutionary framework that uses a large language model as a generative operator to automatically create optimization benchmarks. By generating unconstrained single-objective continuous minimization problems expressed as mathematical formulas, the framework can produce benchmarks that consistently favor a target algorithm over a comparison algorithm in over 80% of trials. Landscape analysis shows that these generated problems exhibit distinct geometric traits, such as sensitivity to variable scaling, reflecting the search behaviors of different optimization methods.
By Yuhiro Ono, Tomohiro Harada, Yukiya Miura
arXiv:2606. 01286v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: The rapid progress of frontier large language models has led to widespread benchmark saturation, limiting the ability of existing datasets to differentiate model capabilities or provide useful training signal.
By Yangzhen Wu, Aaron J. Li, Wenjie Ma, Li Cao, Ziheng Zhou, Mert Cemri, Shu Liu, Yuran Xiu, Chenxiao Yan, Haikun Zhao, Bin Yu, Ion Stoica, Dawn Song
arXiv:2607. 19843v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Large language models (LLMs) have made automated program repair (APR) increasingly practical for real-world bugs, but repairing directly from bug reports remains underconstrained.
By Yuhao Tan, Zhibang Yang, Fangkai Yang, Yuan Yao, Yu Kang, Lu Wang, Pu Zhao, Xin Zhang, Xiaoxing Ma, Qingwei Lin, Saravan Rajmohan, Dongmei Zhang
HARDEN is a constrained evolutionary search method that transforms existing evaluation cases into more challenging variants while preserving their expected outputs. It operates along domain‑specific complexity axes and enforces feasibility constraints such as task semantics, realism, and execution validity. Experiments on FinQA, PubMedQA, and ContractNLI with Qwen3.5 models show that HARDEN can reduce task‑model accuracy by an average of 22.7% and up to 49.9% compared to single‑pass baselines.
By Aditya Kumaran, Rahul Singhal, Karime Maamari, Amine Mhedhbi, Pradyumna Tambwekar
arXiv:2609.35841v1 Announce Type: cross
Abstract: Mutation testing evaluates test-suite adequacy by injecting synthetic faults into program code. However, traditional rule-based tools often generate...
By Nils Kiele, Zainab Saad, Zirui Wang, Steve Drew, Samira Ebrahimi Kahou
arXiv:2601.19066v3 Announce Type: replace-cross
Abstract: Bug Reproduction Tests (BRTs) have been used in many Automated Program Repair (APR) systems, primarily for validating fixes and aiding fix ge...
By Runxiang Cheng, Michele Tufano, Jos\'e Cambronero, Renyao Wei, Sherry Shi, Grant Uy, Pat Rondon, Franjo Ivan\v{c}i\'c
arXiv:2607. 00990v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Large language model (LLM)-based software engineering agents are increasingly developed to resolve software issues by generating patches from issue reports and code repositories.
By Yaoqi Guo, Yang Liu, Jie M. Zhang, Yun Ma, Yiling Lou, Zhenpeng Chen
arXiv:2506. 02594v2 Announce Type: replace Abstract: Large language models (LLMs) are increasingly used to synthesize heuristic programs, yet most existing pipelines optimize solvers against fixed benchmark distributions.
By Ruibo Duan, Yuxin Liu, Haoran Ye, Xinyao Dong, Zhiqiang Xu, Chenglin Fan
Successful mutation strategies in evolutionary code search may contain reusable knowledge that is useful beyond a single run, and in some cases may transfer across related tasks and domains. However, existing LLM-driven evolutionary frameworks largely discard such knowledge, repeatedly rediscovering similar ideas and limiting opportunities for cross-run and cross-task learning.
arXiv:2607. 02469v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Software tests and code evolve together: a code change should be followed by new or updated tests that record the new software behavior.
By Jiale Amber Wang, Kaiyuan Wang, Pengyu Nie
arXiv:2608. 16742v1 Announce Type: cross Abstract: Large Language Models (LLMs) have achieved remarkable progress in code generation, yet ensuring correctness in complex, repository-level tasks remains challenging.
By Hongyue Yu, Kefan Li, Jiakun Li, Hongzheng Chai, Yuan Yuan, Rui He, Junyi Wei
arXiv:2505. 03818v3 Announce Type: replace-cross Abstract: Large Language Models (LLMs) can achieve strong performance on everyday coding tasks, but they can fail on complex tasks that require non-trivial reasoning about program semantics.
By Antonio Valerio Miceli-Barone, Vaishak Belle, Ali Payani