Re: ACATS legal status cleared by FSF

[Geert Bosch <bosch@gnat.com>]

On Thursday, December 6, 2001, at 06:08 , Zack Weinberg wrote:
> I'm 100% confident that there is value to having "make check" drive at
> least some set of Ada tests.  Ever since I've been a member of the
> project I've been seeing patches to the back end go by with a note
> "this code is only used by Ada" or "test case is in Ada" (with the
> implication that writing a C testcase is impossible or at least too
> much work).  How much back end logic is that, that the current test
> suite doesn't even touch?

Yes, I'm confident it does too. That is why I am in favor of adding
these tests and running them. Of all the Ada cases you're talking about,
there has not even been one that was related to a B test. They are
completely useless for testing the backend and almost useless for 
the front end.

I think it is important to realize, that it is easy enough to go and
add B tests later on, if you find they would have caught problems that
went by unnoticed. The tests are available and can be added at any time.
Paying a high upfront price to prevent this scenario that the Ada
maintainers find unlikely to be a problem, seems not a good idea to me.
The only thing it will do is hinder development.

   -Geert