[asdf-devel] ASDF test-op question

[Robert Goldman]

Attila Lendvai wrote:
>> That is why I have been suggesting that we provide a test operation that
>> binds a stream --- because most of the test frameworks I have worked
>> with provide a test report, rather than returning results.
> 
> fyi, stefil returns a CLOS object containing the test results (and
> provides slime inspector customizations to present it specially in the
> inspector).
> 
> as it doesn't work too well through asdf:test-op, it also provides a
> print-object method that prints a minimal text representation of the
> data.
> 
> when test-op'ed, we print the result object to *standard-output*. when
> used interactively, the test defun that was used to start the testing
> simply returns the result value which we inspect in slime when needed.
> 

Do you see the same problems I see?  I find that my test's output can
get interleaved with irrelevant chaff.  So some of our code has
something like this:

(defmethod perform :around ((op our-test-op) c)
   (let ((<special variable> (test-stream op)))
      (call-next-method)))

It's actually far messier than this, because the <special variable>'s
package needs to be wrangled, and I needed to do fussy things with
make-sub-operation (is there some reason this is not a generic
function?) to make sure that our-test-op gets propagated through traverse.

Actually, I tell a lie.  Getting make-sub-operation to do the right
thing was so hard, that I ended up doing something horrible with
CHANGE-CLASS.  The resulting code was not suitable for sensitive eyes.