Re: 'make check' target

[Rik]

John W. Eaton wrote:
> On 22-Feb-2011, Rik wrote:
> 
> | One of those small annoyances is running 'make check' which compiles all,
> | runs the tests, and then produces another page worth of output ending with:
> | 
> | -------------------------------------------------------------------
> | Octave successfully built.  Now choose from the following:
> | 
> |    ./run-octave    - to run in place to test before installing
> |    make check      - to run the tests
> |    make install    - to install (PREFIX=/home/rik/downloads/local)
> | 
> | -------------------------------------------------------------------
> | 
> | First, the extra page means I have to scroll back to see whether the tests
> | passed; second, I already know all about the 'make check' option because I
> | just used it.
> | 
> | What about the attached tiny changeset which adds an explicit check target
> | to the makefile and stops this issue.
> 
> Yes, this would help.
> 
> What do you think about also adding other checks to this target, like
> a check to ensure that source files don't use TAB characters or
> trailing spaces, maybe your spelling and grammar checks, a test to
> ensure that there are no syntax errors in .m files, and other things
> like that?  Or should those checks be separate from "make check"?
I think separate.  'make check' is usually used to verify that the build
worked and that is it.  What about 'maintainer_check' or 'maint_check' in
analogy with 'maintainer_clean' which would really perform a lot of checks
relevant only to developers.

--Rik