Re: [Boost-build] [Boost-testing] Additional testing prerequisites

Subject: Re: [Boost-build] [Boost-testing] Additional testing prerequisites
From: Stefan Seefeld (stefan_at_[hidden])
Date: 2016-10-23 15:18:51

On 20.10.2016 19:27, Niklas Angare wrote:
> "Stefan Seefeld" wrote:
>> On a related note, the
>> http://www.boost.org/development/tests/develop/developer/python.html
>> test matrix displays a disturbing number of failing test runs (runs
>> where almost all tests fail, suggesting a setup problem, rather than a
>> problem with individual tests), and I as the Boost.Python maintainer
>> find myself unable to even try to reproduce or fix those.
>> For now I have set up my own testing on travis-ci (where I only build
>> and test Boost.Python using SCons, instead of Boost.Build), but
>> ultimately I would like to be able to understand all the above failures.
>> Ideally one could figure out a single setup issue and thus flag an
>> entire test run as invalid, improving the signal-to-noise ratio of he
>> tests. I believe all this would be vastly helped using pre-defined
>> containers...
>
> For my test runner NA-QNX650-SP1-x86 which has Python 2.5.2, at least
> some of the failures seem to be caused by the test code trying to use
> newer Python features. The documentation for Boost.Python claims to
> require only Python 2.2. Did the author of those tests forget to
> maintain compatibility, or are those tests only relevant to newer
> versions? If it's the latter, perhaps those tests shouldn't even be
> run when the Python version is too old.

Can you point me to the specific tests / test failures; I may have a
look. (Ideally please follow up with Boost.Python issues in
https://github.com/boostorg/python/issues)

>
> My other runner NA-QNX650-SP1-ARM is cross compiling and the target
> environment doesn't have Python so testing Boost.Python is not
> desirable. Should I disable it with --bjam-options="--without-python"?

I think so (though I'd expect boost.build to do that automatically if
Python can't be detected at config time.)

>
> If you want more information about the configuration of the test
> runners, you could add a test that simply outputs diagnostic
> information unconditionally. For example config_test from Boost.System
> or config_info from Boost.Config do this.
>
> Regards,
>
> Niklas Angare

Thanks,
        Stefan

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