A CO Tester checks a software component for basic conformity with CAPE-OPEN standards. A CO Tester prepares a report which enables any developer to assess the compliance of a piece of software with the CO interface specifications. A CO Tester acts as a basic simulation environment where software components can be plugged in. It is designed to automatically carry out a number of scenarios. First, A CO Tester checks for the existence of the required CO interfaces within the tested software. This constitutes the Basic test. Then each method of each interface is tested on its arguments (existence and type), and on its functionality. This constitutes the Function test. Any developer is also able to run self-designed tests through the Integration test part, where the developer defines the test scenarios.