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Python and TAP

Terry Reedy tjreedy at udel.edu
Mon Feb 6 15:51:54 EST 2012 
On 2/6/2012 7:24 AM, Frank Becker wrote:
> On 06.02.12 01:58, Matej Cepl wrote:

>> I have just finished listening to the FLOSS Weekly podcast #200
>> (http://twit.tv/show/floss-weekly/200) on autotest, where I've learned
>> about the existence of TAP (http://testanything.org/). A standardization
>> of testing seems to be so obviously The Right Thing™, that it is strange
>> that I don't see much related movement in the Python world (I know only

TAP is not about 'standardization of testing' but standardized 
communication of test results between test modules and test harness. 
Python's two stdlib test packages include both test-writing methods and 
a test harness. They are compatible in the sense that doctests can be 
run within the unittest framework.

>> about http://git.codesimply.com/?p=PyTAP.git;a=summary or
>> git://git.codesimply.com/PyTAP.git, which seems to be very very simple
>> and only producer).

I presume PyTAP does something like converting (or rather, wrapping) 
output from unittests to (or rather, within) the TAP format, which 
includes wrapping in YAMLish. Or it provides alternate versions of the 
numerous AssertXxx functions in unittest. This is useful for someone 
running Python tests within a TAP harness, but not otherwise.

>> What am I missing? Why nobody seems to care about joining TAP standard?

The 'TAP standard' is what the Perl TAP module does. There is a 
pre-draft for an IETF standard. You could ask why Perl people don't care 
about joining the unittest 'standard'.

-- 
Terry Jan Reedy
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