Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2003 16:37:04 +0300 From: Mike Makonnen <mtm@identd.net> To: Peter Jeremy <peterjeremy@optushome.com.au> Cc: cvs-all@freebsd.org Subject: Re: cvs commit: projects/validate - Imported sources Message-ID: <20031231133704.GA727@mobile.acsolutions.com> In-Reply-To: <20031231095917.GA1325@server.vk2pj.dyndns.org> References: <200312310900.hBV90nAB023923@repoman.freebsd.org> <20031231095917.GA1325@server.vk2pj.dyndns.org>
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On Wed, Dec 31, 2003 at 08:59:17PM +1100, Peter Jeremy wrote: > On Wed, Dec 31, 2003 at 01:00:49AM -0800, Mike Makonnen wrote: > >mtm 2003/12/31 01:00:49 PST > > > > FreeBSD projects repository > > > > projects/validate - Imported sources > > Update of /home/projcvs/projects/validate > > In directory repoman.freebsd.org:/tmp/cvs-serv23735 > > > > Log Message: > > Initial import of the Linux Test Project (http://ltp.sourceforge.net). > > Out of interest, what is the rationale behind this? I agree that a > POSIX-style test suite would be very useful but I don't see the need > for this to be part of the FreeBSD CVS repository, rather than a port. When a project grows beyond a certain size, it is necessary to have some sort of objective benchmark by which to measure forward progress. It is doubly important for a high visibility project such as FreeBSD. Furthermore, any such undertaking can't be a port because a port is very much independent of the OS version. A 5-CURRENT user and a 4.8-RELEASE user can, for the most part, both use the same port. Any modifications to make the port work with one or the other version is mostly trivial. That's not the case with a test suite. By its nature it cannot be trivially reconfigured to work with one or another release. For example, imagine that between 5.2-RELEASE and 5.3-RELEASE one new test was added and a pre-existing test was modified because of an interface change in 5.3-RELEASE. In the case of a port there are two choices: 1) Some sort of configuration mechanism to build and run the right tests 2) Keep different versions of the port available at all times. While either of these options might be trivial for this one case, there are going to be many such cases as we move into the future, and then it's going to be non-trivial to keep things sane. On the other hand tagging the testsuite in concert with the source tree is much simpler. Any user can run a version of the test suite that will work with his/her system *and* take advantage of any new tests that are MFCed from later releases. Cheers. -- Mike Makonnen | GPG-KEY: http://www.identd.net/~mtm/mtm.asc mtm@identd.net | Fingerprint: 00E8 61BC 0D75 7FFB E4D3 6BF1 B239 D010 3215 D418 mtm@FreeBSD.Org| FreeBSD - Unleash the Daemon !
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