Re: 'I am using make check.'[1]

[Brian Cameron <Brian Cameron Sun COM>]

Luis:

From the perspective of interface stability, running "make check" on
a regular basis is a great thing, because glib and gtk+ include explicit
listings of the ABI (gtk.symbols, etc.) and during 'make check' these
modules check that the built libraries conform to that list of symbols.
In talking with Owen, we noted that glib/gtk only looks at functions and
not data symbols, so the abicheck.sh script didn't catch leakages of
caches/n_caches out of xdgmime.c.

Ideally, this sort of testing should be done for all of the libraries
that the GNOME community expects that developers will need to use to
write a reasonable GNOME-based application.  I think this minimal set
of libraries should include: atk, libglade, pango, libgnomeprint,
libgnomeprintui, and GConf.  Possibly also libgnome, libgnomeui, and
libgnomecanvas if people need these libraries to write a reasonable
GNOME application.

Could the techniques used for glib/gtk+ be expanded to include more
libraries?

Brian

> So, I'm now tinderboxing with 'make check' turned on. 
>
> This is good, in that we have more testing. Maintainers who do not
> immediately start writing tests which run on make check are
> poopieheads. :) [2]
>
> This is bad, in that lots of things are failing right now. I plan to
> file bugs on these as they come. But with a bit of help from xvfb-run,
> not nearly as many as I expected.
>
> Anyway, for the moment, consider this a heads up- if you add tests to
> 'make check' in a core gnome module or dep, you'll get them run
> regularly for free! It's like a *second* pot of gold at the end of the
> tinderbox rainbow.
>
> Also, occasionally that pot of gold will be empty, like so:
> http://www.whitemagic.com.au/images/products/ritualtools/cauldrons/cauldron-med.jpg
>
> and may potentially even contain death, like so:
> http://www.critcononline.com/images/cauldron%20of%20death.jpg
>
> Presumably you will find out about this when you open up your
> desktop-devel mail folder one day and out flys said empty and/or
> deathly cauldron, sent perhaps by me:
>
> http://marvelheros.free.fr/2/images/photo_adam-warlock.gif [3]
>
> If you have tests that you expect will fail regularly for some reason,
> please get in touch with me, so we can figure out what to do about
> them, and you do not get cauldron-of-death-ized.
>
> Thanks, and happy hacking of tests, and perhaps also of things that get tested-
> Luis
>
> [1] This was originally supposed to be a spartacus reference. Now i'm
> thinking more Tiger Woods. Imagine the day when millions of children
> line up to be on TV, saying 'I am Todd Berman.'
>
> [2] A technical term.
>
> [3] I look a lot like this, really. I swear. Especially since I'm
> working out these days.
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