format: v1 name: C TAP Harness maintainer: Russ Allbery version: '4.0' synopsis: C harness for running TAP-compliant tests license: name: Expat copyrights: - holder: Russ Allbery years: 2000-2001, 2004, 2006-2016 - holder: The Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Junior University years: 2006-2009, 2011-2013 build: autoconf: '2.64' automake: '1.11' autotools: true cplusplus: true install: false manpages: true suffix: | Installing C TAP Harness is not normally done. Instead, see the section on using the harness below. type: Autoconf valgrind: true distribution: section: devel tarname: c-tap-harness version: c-tap-harness support: email: eagle@eyrie.org github: rra/c-tap-harness web: https://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/software/c-tap-harness/ vcs: browse: https://git.eyrie.org/?p=devel/c-tap-harness.git github: rra/c-tap-harness openhub: https://www.openhub.net/p/c-tap-harness type: Git url: https://git.eyrie.org/git/devel/c-tap-harness.git docs: api: - name: bail title: bail and sysbail - name: bmalloc title: bmalloc, bcalloc, brealloc, bstrdup, and bstrndup - name: breallocarray title: breallocarray - name: diag title: diag and sysdiag - name: diag_file_add title: diag_file_add and diag_file_remove - name: is_int title: is_bool, is_int, is_double, is_string, and is_hex - name: ok title: ok, okv, and ok_block - name: plan title: plan and plan_lazy - name: skip title: skip and skip_block - name: skip_all title: skip_all - name: test_cleanup_register title: test_cleanup_register - name: test_file_path title: test_file_path and test_file_path_free - name: test_tmpdir title: test_tmpdir and test_tmpdir_free user: - name: writing title: Writing TAP tests - name: runtests title: runtests manual page blurb: | C TAP Harness is a pure-C implementation of TAP, the Test Anything Protocol. TAP is the text-based protocol used by Perl's test suite. This package provides a harness similar to Perl's Test::Harness for running tests, with some additional features useful for test suites in packages that use Autoconf and Automake, and C and shell libraries to make writing TAP-compliant test programs easier. description: | This package started as the runtests program I wrote for INN in 2000 to serve as the basis for a new test suite using a test protocol similar to that used for Perl modules. When I started maintaining additional C packages, I adopted runtests for the test suite driver of those as well, resulting in further improvements but also separate copies of the same program in different distributions. The C TAP Harness distribution merges all the various versions into a single code base that all my packages can pull from. C TAP Harness provides a full TAP specification driver (apart from a few possible edge cases) and has additional special features for supporting builds outside the source directory. It's mostly useful for packages using Autoconf and Automake and because it doesn't assume or require Perl. The runtests program can be built with knowledge of the source and build directory and pass that knowledge on to test scripts, and will search for test scripts in both the source and build directory. This makes it easier for packages using Autoconf and Automake and supporting out-of-tree builds to build some test programs, ship others, and run them all regardless of what tree they're in. It also makes it easier for test cases to find their supporting files when they run. Also included in this package are C and shell libraries that provide utility functions for writing test scripts that use TAP to report results. The C library also provides a variety of utility functions useful for test programs running as part of an Automake-built package: finding test data files, creating temporary files, reporting output from external programs running in the background, and similar common problems. requirements: | C TAP Harness requires a C compiler to build. Any ISO C89 or later C compiler on a system supporting the Single UNIX Specification, version 3 (SUSv3) should be sufficient. This should not be a problem on any modern system. The test suite and shell library require a Bourne-compatible shell. Outside of the test suite, C TAP Harness has no other prerequisites or requirements. To run the test suite, you will need Perl plus the Perl module Test::More, which comes with Perl 5.8 or later. The following additional Perl modules will be used by the test suite if present: * Test::Pod * Test::Spelling All are available on CPAN. Those tests will be skipped if the modules are not available. sections: - title: Using the Harness body: | While there is an install target that installs runtests in the default binary directory (`/usr/local/bin` by default) and installs the man pages, one normally wouldn't install anything from this package. Instead, the code is intended to be copied into your package and refreshed from the latest release of C TAP Harness for each release. You can obviously copy the code and integrate it however works best for your package and your build system. Here's how I do it for my packages as an example: * Create a tests directory and copy tests/runtests.c into it. Create a `tests/tap` subdirectory and copy the portions of the TAP library (from `tests/tap`) that I need for that package into it. The TAP library is designed to let you drop in additional source and header files for additional utility functions that are useful in your package. * Add code to my top-level `Makefile.am` (I always use a non-recursive Makefile with `subdir-objects` set) to build `runtests` and the test library: ```make check_PROGRAMS = tests/runtests tests_runtests_CPPFLAGS = -DC_TAP_SOURCE='"$(abs_top_srcdir)/tests"' \ -DC_TAP_BUILD='"$(abs_top_builddir)/tests"' check_LIBRARIES = tests/tap/libtap.a tests_tap_libtap_a_CPPFLAGS = -I$(abs_top_srcdir)/tests tests_tap_libtap_a_SOURCES = tests/tap/basic.c tests/tap/basic.h \ tests/tap/float.c tests/tap/float.h tests/tap/macros.h ``` Omit `float.c` and `float.h` from the last line if your package doesn't need the `is_double` function. Building the build and source directories into runtests will let `tests/runtests -o ` work for users without requiring that they set any other variables, even if they're doing an out-of-source build. Add additional source files and headers that should go into the TAP library if you added extra utility functions for your package. * Add code to `Makefile.am` to run the test suite: ```make check-local: $(check_PROGRAMS) cd tests && ./runtests -l $(abs_top_srcdir)/tests/TESTS ``` See the `Makefile.am` in this package for an example. * List the test programs in the `tests/TESTS` file. This should have the name of the test executable with the trailing "-t" or ".t" (you can use either extension as you prefer) omitted. Test programs must be executable. For any test programs that need to be compiled, add build rules for them in `Makefile.am`, similar to: ```make tests_libtap_c_basic_LDADD = tests/tap/libtap.a ``` and add them to `check_PROGRAMS`. If you include the `float.c` add-on in your libtap library, you will need to add `-lm` to the `_LDADD` setting for all test programs linked against it. A more complex example from the remctl package that needs additional libraries: ```make tests_client_open_t_LDFLAGS = $(GSSAPI_LDFLAGS) tests_client_open_t_LDADD = client/libremctl.la tests/tap/libtap.a \ util/libutil.la $(GSSAPI_LIBS) ``` If the test program doesn't need to be compiled, add it to `EXTRA_DIST` so that it will be included in the distribution. * If you have test programs written in shell, copy `tests/tap/libtap.sh` the tap subdirectory of your tests directory and add it to `EXTRA_DIST`. Shell programs should start with: ```sh . "${C_TAP_SOURCE}/tap/libtap.sh" ``` and can then use the functions defined in the library. * Optionally copy `docs/writing-tests` into your package somewhere, such as `tests/README`, as instructions to contributors on how to write tests for this framework. If you have configuration files that the user must create to enable some of the tests, conventionally they go into `tests/config`. If you have data files that your test cases use, conventionally they go into `tests/data`. You can then find the data directory relative to the `C_TAP_SOURCE` environment variable (set by `runtests`) in your test program. If you have data that's compiled or generated by Autoconf, it will be relative to the `BUILD` environment variable. Don't forget to add test data to `EXTRA_DIST` as necessary. For more TAP library add-ons, generally ones that rely on additional portability code not shipped in this package or with narrower uses, see [the rra-c-util package](https://www.eyrie.org/~eagle/software/rra-c-util/). There are several additional TAP library add-ons in the `tests/tap` directory in that package. It's also an example of how to use this test harness in another package. test: override: | C TAP Harness comes with a test suite, which you can run after building with: ``` make check ``` If a test fails, you can run a single test with verbose output via: ``` ./runtests -b `pwd`/tests -s `pwd`/tests -o ``` Do this instead of running the test program directly since it will ensure that necessary environment variables are set up. You may need to change the `-s` option argument if you build with a separate build directory from the source directory.