libarchive fails tests on i686

libarchive fails tests on i686

[Ricardo Wurmus]

Hi Guix,

libarchive fails two tests in tar/test/test_option_b.  Here is the test
output:

  test_option_b

  tar/test/test_option_b.c:41: File archive1.tar has size 3072, expected 2048
     Description: bsdtar does not pad archives written directly to regular files
  tar/test/test_option_b.c:63: File archive5.tar has size 3072, expected 2048

libarchive has not yet been built for i686 on hydra, so there are no
binary substitutes available.  The failure to build libarchive blocks
other packages such as qt.

Should we disable the tests for now or does anyone know how to fix them?

~~ Ricardo

Re: libarchive fails tests on i686

[Andreas Enge]

On Thu, Mar 05, 2015 at 10:47:53AM +0100, Ricardo Wurmus wrote:
> libarchive has not yet been built for i686 on hydra, so there are no
> binary substitutes available.  The failure to build libarchive blocks
> other packages such as qt.

It is a bit strange that we should depend on bsdtar and bsdcpio... Well,
probably it is the library libarchive. The dependency comes in through
cmake (and is actually not detected by "guix refresh -l libarchive").

In linuxfromscratch, libarchive is only mentioned as "recommended" to build
cmake:
   http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/general/cmake.html
So maybe we could take it out from the cmake inputs?

Or maybe we should build libarchive with the configure flags
  --disable-bsdtar --disable-bsdcpio
(and then the tests would not be run...); after all, we have gnu tar and
gnu cpio.

What do you think?

Andreas

Re: libarchive fails tests on i686

[Ricardo Wurmus]

Andreas Enge writes:

> On Thu, Mar 05, 2015 at 10:47:53AM +0100, Ricardo Wurmus wrote:
>> libarchive has not yet been built for i686 on hydra, so there are no
>> binary substitutes available.  The failure to build libarchive blocks
>> other packages such as qt.
>
> It is a bit strange that we should depend on bsdtar and bsdcpio... Well,
> probably it is the library libarchive. The dependency comes in through
> cmake (and is actually not detected by "guix refresh -l libarchive").
>
> In linuxfromscratch, libarchive is only mentioned as "recommended" to build
> cmake:
>    http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/general/cmake.html
> So maybe we could take it out from the cmake inputs?

I do not know enough about this to decide either way.

> Or maybe we should build libarchive with the configure flags
>   --disable-bsdtar --disable-bsdcpio
> (and then the tests would not be run...); after all, we have gnu tar and
> gnu cpio.

I haven't yet looked more closely at what the tests are trying to
establish.  Are you suggesting that the tests fail because GNU tar
behaves differently?

> What do you think?

I would like to understand the test failure better, but on the other
side this failure blocks a considerable number of packages motivating me
to get rid of the problem.  I don't know what side effects the above
configure flags would have.  Could we just disable these tests for now?

~~ Ricardo

Re: libarchive fails tests on i686

[Andreas Enge]

On Thu, Mar 05, 2015 at 11:54:42PM +0100, Ricardo Wurmus wrote:

> > In linuxfromscratch, libarchive is only mentioned as "recommended" to build
> > cmake:
> >    http://www.linuxfromscratch.org/blfs/view/svn/general/cmake.html
> > So maybe we could take it out from the cmake inputs?
>
> I do not know enough about this to decide either way.

In that case, from what I understand, cmake will use its bundled copy, so it
is not a good idea to drop the input.

> I haven't yet looked more closely at what the tests are trying to
> establish.  Are you suggesting that the tests fail because GNU tar
> behaves differently?

I wondered about this; it is quite probable they behave differently.
But the Makefile calls a test program which I think is bsdtar in this case.

> I would like to understand the test failure better, but on the other
> side this failure blocks a considerable number of packages motivating me
> to get rid of the problem.  I don't know what side effects the above
> configure flags would have.  Could we just disable these tests for now?

Well, I suppose they have no side effects except for disabling the build
of bsdtar and bsdcpio, and I do not see why we would have a use for them
on guix. Cmake itself links to libarchive as shown by "ldd", so it should
not be affected.

Andreas