Re: Modifiable NMERGE in sort

[Jim Meyering]

"Bo Borgerson" <address@hidden> wrote:

> On Mon, Mar 31, 2008 at 2:29 AM, Paul Eggert <address@hidden> wrote:
>  > Alas, that patch assumes C99, and we can't assume that quite yet.
>  >  Also, it mishandles nmerge values that are "too large" (you'll get
>  >  core dumps or worse on many hosts).  That being said, it might be
>  >  worth adding an option like that (it's a bit specialized, but it's a
>  >  big performance win in some cases).
>  >

One more suggestion ;-)

    Add tests
    ==========
    Nearly every significant change must be accompanied by a test suite
    addition that exercises it.  If you fix a bug, add at least one test that
    fails without the patch, but that succeeds once your patch is applied.
    If you add a feature, add tests to exercise as much of the new code
    as possible.

    There are hundreds of tests in the tests/ directories.  You can use
    tests/sample-test as a template, or one of the various Perl-based ones
    in tests/misc.

    If writing tests is not your thing, don't worry too much about it,
    but do provide scenarios, input/output pairs, or whatever, along with
    examples of running the tool to demonstrate the new or changed feature,
    and someone else will massage that into a test (writing portable tests
    can be a challenge).