[CMake] Target to build only unit tests?

[Robert Dailey]

I've managed to workaround this in Visual Studio by using a solution folder
for my unit tests. I can then right-click the solution folder and click
"Build", and that will build all my tests.

I actually like the dependency idea, it is simple and straight forward. I
have common code that defines my tests, so I can easily accumulate a list
of those tests and at the end, define a custom target that depends on all
of them.

Would be nice to see CMake have builtin support for this, though. There
could be a BUILD_TESTS CMake predefined target in visual studio.

---------
Robert Dailey


On Wed, Dec 21, 2011 at 1:12 PM, Andreas Mohr <andi at lisas.de> wrote:

> Hi,
>
> On Wed, Dec 21, 2011 at 11:59:13AM -0500, cmake-request at cmake.org wrote:
> > Date: Wed, 21 Dec 2011 11:52:27 -0500
> > From: David Cole <david.cole at kitware.com>
> > Subject: Re: [CMake] Target to build only unit tests?
> > To: Robert Dailey <rcdailey at gmail.com>
> > Cc: CMake ML <cmake at cmake.org>
> > Message-ID:
> >       <
> CAAdwe9XG5mOOEnNxWSx0GYLCZwqC_7TuYBY+8ZO0W4tu+-cHcg at mail.gmail.com>
> > Content-Type: text/plain; charset=ISO-8859-1
> >
> > On Wed, Dec 21, 2011 at 11:29 AM, Robert Dailey <rcdailey at gmail.com>
> wrote:
> > > Is there a target generated by CMake to build ONLY unit tests? I'm
> using
> > > Visual Studio 2008.
> > >
> >
> > No, there is not.
> >
> >
> > > If not, is there a way I can make one?
> >
> > Yes, of course. You can do anything you want with a combination of
> > add_custom_command and add_custom_target.
>
>
> Something worthwhile might be (whipped up quickly, untested):
>
> # Implement include guard (e.g. reduce cmake --trace clutter)
> if(UNIT_TEST_HELPERS_DEFINED)
>  return()
> endif(UNIT_TEST_HELPERS_DEFINED)
> set(UNIT_TEST_HELPERS_DEFINED true)
>
> if(NOT TARGET unit_tests_all)
>  add_custom_target(unit_tests_all ALL)
> endif(NOT TARGET unit_tests_all)
>
> # Properly very worthwhile to have a fixed convention for unit test
> # targets. Or perhaps use "unit_test_"? (...too?)
> set(unit_test_targets_common_name_prefix "ut_")
>
> function(unit_test_register_conditional _target)
>  if(_target MATCHES "^${unit_test_targets_common_name_prefix}")
>    add_dependencies(unit_tests_all ${_target})
>  endif(_target MATCHES "^${unit_test_targets_common_name_prefix}")
> function(unit_test_register_conditional _target)
>
> function(super_power_target_post_handling _target)
>  unit_test_register_conditional(${_target})
>  ...something_else_that_might_be_useful...()
> endfunction(super_power_target_post_handling _target)
>
>
> Then push that code into a CMake Module file (to be added to
> cmake/Modules/ in your source root or some such),
> and do
> include(ModuleName)
> where needed, and call
> super_power_target_post_handling(current_target)
> for every target where common post-handling might be useful.
>
> But obviously super_power_target_post_handling() shouldn't fetch
> your morning cereals - it should still contain functionality
> that's specific enough, to not end up with messy imprecise (unknown!)
> handling
> that might change at any time.
>
>
>
> And then, in case there's a build shell script, one could implement
> poor man's unit test handling by doing something like:
>
> [ ... run build stuff ... ]
> pseudo_random=$(date +%s) # UNIX Epoch seconds (don't use %N nanoseconds
> since it's not portable, plus it's overkill)
> run_tests=$((${pseudo_random} % 42)) # modulo, obviously
> if [ ${run_tests} -eq 0 ]; then
>  echo "INFO: running unit tests..."
>  [[[ result of grep CMAKE_BUILD_COMMAND CMakeCache.txt ]]] unit_tests_all
> fi
>
> Andreas Mohr
>
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