Alternate Test::Harness

pbeckingham has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

My question is about alternate test harnesses. I have used Test::Harness many times, and am very happy with it.

But I would like to use it to provide users with a means to validate the configuration of my (rather complex) application, environment etc, allowing them to use it to troubleshoot. To do this, I need it to run silently, and report only the problems. It is otherwise just too verbose. I realize this is not the intended use of Test::Harness.

I have not been able to find alternate modules, and before my last resort of writing my own, I would like to hear if anyone knows of a suitable module?

Thank you.

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Re: Alternate Test::Harness by chromatic (Archbishop) on Mar 12, 2004 at 03:10 UTC
I'd suggest Test::Harness::Straps, though you may have to work with petdance to make it work. :)	[reply]
•Re: Alternate Test::Harness by merlyn (Sage) on Mar 12, 2004 at 04:32 UTC
That's exactly what I did for one of my columns on checking website health. Be sure you read the previous month's column as well. -- Randal L. Schwartz, Perl hacker Be sure to read my standard disclaimer if this is a reply.	[reply]
Re: Alternate Test::Harness by TomDLux (Vicar) on Mar 12, 2004 at 03:02 UTC
Test::Harness is wonderful, but not necessary with Test::More. Simply run the script on its own. There can be complications if the tests are for a module, as they expect to be run from a higher directory. Just remember which directory to be in when you invoke the script -- `TTTATCGGTCGTTATATAGATGTTTGCA`	[reply]
Re: Alternate Test::Harness by seattlejohn (Deacon) on Mar 12, 2004 at 06:22 UTC
Could you just use Test::Harness and grep out everything except the cases you want to report? (This is my preferred method for viewing test output anyway. I don't want to know about the hundreds of tests that succeeded, just the handful that failed.) $perlmonks{seattlejohn} = 'John Clyman';	[reply]
Re: Re: Alternate Test::Harness by pbeckingham (Parson) on Mar 12, 2004 at 07:00 UTC
I could run `Test::Harness` and suppress the output, but there's just something about all that interactive counting of tests (and there are 2000 tests) that I don't want to deal with. Just in the way that `Test::Harness` counts tests from 1 to 10, means that I get unbuffered characters and backspaces sent. `Test::Harness` is too verbose - I agree. I'd rather see a one-line summary on complete success, with no other output. Thanks for the suggestion - it will be "Plan B". In fact, thanks to everyone.	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Alternate Test::Harness by esskar (Deacon) on Mar 12, 2004 at 02:49 UTC
what about `Test::More` and all the other `Test::*s` ?	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Re: Alternate Test::Harness by pbeckingham (Parson) on Mar 12, 2004 at 02:52 UTC
I'm actually using `Test::More` now, but that one is for writing the actual tests. I'm interested in the harness that runs and summarizes the tests, rather than the tests themselves.	[reply] [d/l]