Re: unit testing with autotools

[Ralf Wildenhues]

Hi Chris,

* Chris Pickett wrote on Mon, Mar 13, 2006 at 06:13:07PM CET:
> 
> I'd like to do unit testing for test-driven development of C programs. 
> I'd also like to use up-to-date autotools.  I was wondering if anyone 
> had any experience with unit testing in their projects and had 
> recommendations, or even if autoconf was considering it for the future.
> 
> By unit testing I mean writing multiple small tests for each function in 
> an interface.  The prescribed development methodology is to write 
> failing tests before you write code that will make them pass.
> 
> Autotest would be good as a wrapper around a unit-testing framework, but 
> not good for driving the actual low-level tests.  The same goes for 
> DejaGNU.

Out of curiosity: why exactly do Autotest and DejaGNU not qualify for
this job?  Which parts are missing?

> I'm also interested in more detailed or "best practice" autotest 
> tutorials but the advice in the archives seems to be, "look at other 
> projects and existing tutorials and cobble something together."

FWIW, CVS M4 and CVS Libtool use Autotest.

Cheers,
Ralf