[Python-Dev] built-in Python test runner (was: Python Language Summit at PyCon: Agenda)

[Robert Collins]

On 5 March 2013 20:02, Lennart Regebro <regebro at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Tue, Mar 5, 2013 at 1:41 AM, Robert Collins
> <robertc at robertcollins.net> wrote:
>> So that is interesting, but its not sufficient to meet the automation
>> need Barry is calling out, unless all test suites can be run by
>> 'python -m unittest discover' with no additional parameters [and a
>> pretty large subset cannot].
>
> But can they be changed so they are? That's gotta be the important bit.

In principle maybe. Need to talk with the trial developers, nose
developers, py.test developers etc - to get consensus on a number of
internal API friction points.

> What's needed here is not a tool that can run all unittests in
> existence, but an official way for automated tools to run tests, with
> the ability for any test and test framework to hook into that, so that
> you can run any test suite automatically from an automated tool. The,
> once that mechanism has been identified/implemented, we need to tell
> everybody to do this.

I think the command line is the right place to do that - declare as
metadata the command line to run a packages tests.

> I don't care much what that mechanism is, but I think the easiest way
> to get there is to tell people to extend distutils with a test command
> (or use Distribute) and perhaps add such a command in 3.4 that will do
> the unittest discover thingy. I remember looking into zope.testrunner
> hooking into that mechanism as well, but I don't remember what the
> outcome was.

Agreed.

-Rob

-- 
Robert Collins <rbtcollins at hp.com>
Distinguished Technologist
HP Cloud Services