From mboxrd@z Thu Jan 1 00:00:00 1970 Path: news.gmane.org!.POSTED.blaine.gmane.org!not-for-mail From: Paul Eggert Newsgroups: gmane.emacs.devel Subject: Re: make check fails due to missing test directory Date: Sat, 4 May 2019 08:56:19 -0700 Organization: UCLA Computer Science Department Message-ID: References: <83d0kzmjw6.fsf@gnu.org> <20190504092406.GA4139@ACM> Mime-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=utf-8; format=flowed Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Injection-Info: blaine.gmane.org; posting-host="blaine.gmane.org:195.159.176.226"; logging-data="120937"; mail-complaints-to="usenet@blaine.gmane.org" User-Agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64; rv:60.0) Gecko/20100101 Thunderbird/60.6.1 Cc: noloader@gmail.com, Eli Zaretskii , emacs-devel@gnu.org To: Alan Mackenzie Original-X-From: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Sat May 04 17:57:09 2019 Return-path: Envelope-to: ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org Original-Received: from lists.gnu.org ([209.51.188.17]) by blaine.gmane.org with esmtps (TLS1.0:RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:256) (Exim 4.89) (envelope-from ) id 1hMx2D-000VME-IX for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sat, 04 May 2019 17:57:09 +0200 Original-Received: from localhost ([127.0.0.1]:58172 helo=lists.gnu.org) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1hMx2C-0001xh-Ht for ged-emacs-devel@m.gmane.org; Sat, 04 May 2019 11:57:08 -0400 Original-Received: from eggs.gnu.org ([209.51.188.92]:40103) by lists.gnu.org with esmtp (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1hMx1c-0001xc-C3 for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sat, 04 May 2019 11:56:33 -0400 Original-Received: from Debian-exim by eggs.gnu.org with spam-scanned (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1hMx1b-0007QT-G8 for emacs-devel@gnu.org; Sat, 04 May 2019 11:56:32 -0400 Original-Received: from zimbra.cs.ucla.edu ([131.179.128.68]:43168) by eggs.gnu.org with esmtps (TLS1.0:DHE_RSA_AES_256_CBC_SHA1:32) (Exim 4.71) (envelope-from ) id 1hMx1Z-0007KV-GT; Sat, 04 May 2019 11:56:29 -0400 Original-Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by zimbra.cs.ucla.edu (Postfix) with ESMTP id 8A3BC16183D; Sat, 4 May 2019 08:56:24 -0700 (PDT) Original-Received: from zimbra.cs.ucla.edu ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (zimbra.cs.ucla.edu [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10032) with ESMTP id kZJ7HTJiCces; Sat, 4 May 2019 08:56:23 -0700 (PDT) Original-Received: from localhost (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by zimbra.cs.ucla.edu (Postfix) with ESMTP id BE2341618EC; Sat, 4 May 2019 08:56:23 -0700 (PDT) X-Virus-Scanned: amavisd-new at zimbra.cs.ucla.edu Original-Received: from zimbra.cs.ucla.edu ([127.0.0.1]) by localhost (zimbra.cs.ucla.edu [127.0.0.1]) (amavisd-new, port 10026) with ESMTP id Jhf7zcBiA18A; Sat, 4 May 2019 08:56:23 -0700 (PDT) Original-Received: from [192.168.1.9] (cpe-23-242-74-103.socal.res.rr.com [23.242.74.103]) by zimbra.cs.ucla.edu (Postfix) with ESMTPSA id 8376F1617D1; Sat, 4 May 2019 08:56:23 -0700 (PDT) In-Reply-To: <20190504092406.GA4139@ACM> Content-Language: en-US X-detected-operating-system: by eggs.gnu.org: GNU/Linux 3.x X-Received-From: 131.179.128.68 X-BeenThere: emacs-devel@gnu.org X-Mailman-Version: 2.1.21 Precedence: list List-Id: "Emacs development discussions." List-Unsubscribe: , List-Archive: List-Post: List-Help: List-Subscribe: , Errors-To: emacs-devel-bounces+ged-emacs-devel=m.gmane.org@gnu.org Original-Sender: "Emacs-devel" Xref: news.gmane.org gmane.emacs.devel:236154 Archived-At: Alan Mackenzie wrote: > The tests in make check are development tests. They're not build tests. > In fact, they're fairly useless for anybody who isn't developing Emacs. > Somebody who is developing Emacs will have the git repository. In what sense does Emacs differ from other GNU packages, like Coreutils? Coreutils has a series of tests that are similarly "useless" for anybody who isn't developing Coreutils. However, builders of Coreutils can run 'make check' to run these tests. If tests fail, builders can decide themselves whether to install the build, or to stick with an older version. And they can report problems to developers, often problems that the developers themselves couldn't easily find. The developers and builders can then collaborate to fix the problem. Yes, the process can be a bit awkward, but it beats leaving the bugs unfixed. And no part of this process requires builders to understand the code well enough to fix it. Why shouldn't Emacs do that too?