----- "David E Jones" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > I don't believe I've ever been in favor of enforcing a rule requiring > new features to be accompanied by automated tests. In fact, I think > I've spoken/written against that a number of times. > Like you say, this may reduce contributions. The bigger issue with a > > community-driven project is that people are motivated by a small > number of things: > > 1. what they or their clients need (strong) > 2. social pressure from others in the community (semi-strong) > 3. desire for recognition (fairly weak) > 4. desire to create something good/new (fairly weak)
I don't think we should underestimate the fact that developing good tests is as distinct a skill set as writing good database code or understanding concurrent programming. One very tough problem about required tests would be that many people simply don't have experience with Selenium or any of the other test frameworks. This is probably especially true as you get into more rarified skill sets. Certainly there will be a few unusual people who feel they can master everything but many people tend to specialize. Maybe we could have testing play a more central and public role in the project? Try and turn testing into an area that gets you instant recognition? Also, maybe we can look for users that have more of an interest in testing (ie. customers) and get them more involved in core platform testing? -- Ean Schuessler, CTO Brainfood.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] - http://www.brainfood.com - 214-720-0700 x 315
