AVOCADO(1)

General Commands Manual

AVOCADO(1)

NAME¶

avocado - test runner command line tool

SYNOPSIS¶

avocado [-h] [-v] [--config [CONFIG_FILE]] [--show [STREAM[:LVL]]] [-s]: {config,diff,distro,exec-path,list,multiplex,plugins,run,sysinfo} ...

DESCRIPTION¶

Avocado is a modern test framework that is built on the experience accumulated with autotest (http://autotest.github.io).

avocado is also the name of its test runner command line tool, described in this man page.

For more information about the Avocado project, please check its website: http://avocado-framework.github.io/

OPTIONS¶

The following list of options are builtin, application level avocado options. Most other options are implemented via plugins and will depend on them being loaded (avocado --help):

-h, --help            show this help message and exit
-v, --version         show program's version number and exit
--config [CONFIG_FILE]


                      Use custom configuration from a file
--show [STREAM[:LVL]]


                      List of comma separated builtin logs, or logging


                      streams optionally followed by LEVEL (DEBUG,INFO,...).


                      Builtin streams are: "test": test output; "debug":


                      tracebacks and other debugging info; "app":


                      application output; "early": early logging of other


                      streams, including test (very verbose); "remote":


                      fabric/paramiko debug; "all": all builtin streams;


                      "none": disables regular output (leaving only errors


                      enabled). By default: 'app'
-s, --silent          disables regular output (leaving only errors enabled)

Real use of avocado depends on running avocado subcommands. This a typical list of avocado subcommands:

config              Shows avocado config keys
diff                Shows the difference between 2 jobs.
distro              Shows detected Linux distribution
exec-path           Returns path to avocado bash libraries and exits.
list                List available tests
multiplex           Tool to analyze and visualize test variants and params
plugins             Displays plugin information
run                 Runs one or more tests (native test, test alias,


                    binary or script)
sysinfo             Collect system information

To get usage instructions for a given subcommand, run it with --help. Example:

$ avocado run --help

Options for subcommand run (avocado run --help):

positional arguments:


  TEST_REFERENCE        List of test references (aliases or paths)
optional arguments:


  -h, --help            show this help message and exit


  -d, --dry-run         Instead of running the test only list them and log


                        their params.


  --force-job-id UNIQUE_JOB_ID


                        Forces the use of a particular job ID. Used internally


                        when interacting with an avocado server. You should


                        not use this option unless you know exactly what


                        you're doing


  --job-results-dir DIRECTORY


                        Forces to use of an alternate job results directory.


  --job-timeout SECONDS


                        Set the maximum amount of time (in SECONDS) that tests


                        are allowed to execute. Values <= zero means "no


                        timeout". You can also use suffixes, like: s


                        (seconds), m (minutes), h (hours).


  --failfast {on,off}   Enable or disable the job interruption on first failed


                        test.


  --keep-tmp {on,off}   Keep job temporary files (useful for avocado


                        debugging). Defaults to off.


  --sysinfo {on,off}    Enable or disable system information (hardware


                        details, profilers, etc.). Current: on


  --execution-order {tests-per-variant,variants-per-test}


                        How to iterate through test suite and variants
output and result format:


  -s, --silent          Silence stdout


  --show-job-log        Display only the job log on stdout. Useful for test


                        debugging purposes. No output will be displayed if you


                        also specify --silent


  --store-logging-stream [STREAM[:LEVEL] [STREAM[:LEVEL] ...]]


                        Store given logging STREAMs in


                        $JOB_RESULTS_DIR/$STREAM.$LEVEL.


  --html FILE           Enable HTML output to the FILE where the result should


                        be written. The value - (output to stdout) is not


                        supported since not all HTML resources can be embedded


                        into a single file (page resources will be copied to


                        the output file dir)


  --open-browser        Open the generated report on your preferred browser.


                        This works even if --html was not explicitly passed,


                        since an HTML report is always generated on the job


                        results dir. Current: False


  --html-job-result {on,off}


                        Enables default HTML result in the job results


                        directory. File will be located at


                        "html/results.html".


  --journal             Records test status changes (for use with avocado-


                        journal-replay and avocado-server)


  --json FILE           Enable JSON result format and write it to FILE. Use


                        '-' to redirect to the standard output.


  --json-job-result {on,off}


                        Enables default JSON result in the job results


                        directory. File will be named "results.json".


  --tap FILE            Enable TAP result output and write it to FILE. Use '-'


                        to redirect to the standard output.


  --tap-job-result {on,off}


                        Enables default TAP result in the job results


                        directory. File will be named "results.tap".


  --tap-include-logs    Include test logs as comments in TAP output. Defaults


                        to False


  --xunit FILE          Enable xUnit result format and write it to FILE. Use


                        '-' to redirect to the standard output.


  --xunit-job-result {on,off}


                        Enables default xUnit result in the job results


                        directory. File will be named "results.xml".


  --xunit-job-name XUNIT_JOB_NAME


                        Override the reported job name. By default uses the


                        Avocado job name which is always unique. This is


                        useful for reporting in Jenkins as it only evaluates


                        first-failure from jobs of the same name.


  --xunit-max-test-log-chars SIZE


                        Limit the attached job log to given number of


                        characters (k/m/g suffix allowed)


  -z, --archive         Archive (ZIP) files generated by tests
output check arguments:


  --output-check-record {none,all,stdout,stderr}


                        Record output streams of your tests to reference files


                        (valid options: none (do not record output streams),


                        all (record both stdout and stderr), stdout (record


                        only stderr), stderr (record only stderr). Current:


                        none


  --output-check {on,off}


                        Enable or disable test output (stdout/stderr) check.


                        If this option is off, no output will be checked, even


                        if there are reference files present for the test.


                        Current: on (output check enabled)
loader options:


  --loaders [LOADERS [LOADERS ...]]


                        Overrides the priority of the test loaders. You can


                        specify either @loader_name or TEST_TYPE. By default


                        it tries all available loaders according to priority


                        set in settings->plugins.loaders.


  --external-runner EXECUTABLE


                        Path to an specific test runner that allows the use of


                        its own tests. This should be used for running tests


                        that do not conform to Avocado' SIMPLE testinterface


                        and can not run standalone. Note: the use of


                        --external-runner overwrites the --loaders to


                        "external_runner"


  --external-runner-chdir {runner,test}


                        Change directory before executing tests. This option


                        may be necessary because of requirements and/or


                        limitations of the external test runner. If the


                        external runner requires to be run from its own base


                        directory,use "runner" here. If the external runner


                        runs tests based on files and requires to be run from


                        the directory where those files are located, use


                        "test" here and specify the test directory with the


                        option "--external-runner-testdir". Defaults to "None"


  --external-runner-testdir DIRECTORY


                        Where test files understood by the external test


                        runner are located in the filesystem. Obviously this


                        assumes and only applies to external test runners that


                        run tests from files
filtering parameters:


  --filter-by-tags TAGS


                        Filter INSTRUMENTED tests based on ":avocado:


                        tags=tag1,tag2" notation in their class docstring


  --filter-by-tags-include-empty


                        Include all tests without tags during filtering. This


                        effectively means they will be kept in the test suite


                        found previously to filtering.
test execution inside docker container:


  --docker IMAGE        Name of the docker image torun tests on.


  --docker-cmd CMD      Override the docker command, eg. 'sudo docker' or


                        other base docker options like hypervisor. Default:


                        'docker'


  --docker-options OPT  Extra options for docker run cmd. (see: man docker-


                        run)


  --docker-no-cleanup   Preserve container after test
keep environment variables:


  --env-keep ENV_KEEP   Keep environment variables in remote executions
GNU Debugger support:


  --gdb-run-bin EXECUTABLE[:BREAKPOINT]


                        Run a given executable inside the GNU debugger,


                        pausing at a given breakpoint (defaults to "main")


  --gdb-prerun-commands EXECUTABLE:COMMANDS


                        After loading an executable in GDB, but before


                        actually running it, execute the GDB commands in the


                        given file. EXECUTABLE is optional, if omitted


                        COMMANDS will apply to all executables


  --gdb-coredump {on,off}


                        Automatically generate a core dump when the inferior


                        process received a fatal signal such as SIGSEGV or


                        SIGABRT
test execution on a remote machine:


  --remote-hostname REMOTE_HOSTNAME


                        Specify the hostname to login on remote machine


  --remote-port REMOTE_PORT


                        Specify the port number to login on remote machine.


                        Current: 22


  --remote-username REMOTE_USERNAME


                        Specify the username to login on remote machine.


                        Current: apahim


  --remote-password REMOTE_PASSWORD


                        Specify the password to login on remote machine


  --remote-key-file REMOTE_KEY_FILE


                        Specify an identity file with a private key instead of


                        a password (Example: .pem files from Amazon EC2)


  --remote-timeout SECONDS


                        Amount of time (in seconds) to wait for a successful


                        connection to the remote machine. Defaults to 60


                        seconds.
job replay:


  --replay REPLAY_JOBID


                        Replay a job identified by its (partial) hash id. Use


                        "--replay latest" to replay the latest job.


  --replay-test-status REPLAY_TESTSTATUS


                        Filter tests to replay by test status


  --replay-ignore REPLAY_IGNORE


                        Ignore variants (variants) and/or configuration


                        (config) from the source job
resultsdb options:


  --resultsdb-api RESULTSDB_API


                        Specify the resultsdb API url


  --resultsdb-logs RESULTSDB_LOGS


                        Specify the URL where the logs are published
test execution on a Virtual Machine:


  --vm-domain VM_DOMAIN


                        Specify Libvirt Domain Name


  --vm-hypervisor-uri VM_HYPERVISOR_URI


                        Specify hypervisor URI driver connection. Current:


                        qemu:///system


  --vm-hostname VM_HOSTNAME


                        Specify VM hostname to login. By default Avocado


                        attempts to automatically find the VM IP address.


  --vm-port VM_PORT     Specify the port number to login on VM. Current: 22


  --vm-username VM_USERNAME


                        Specify the username to login on VM


  --vm-password VM_PASSWORD


                        Specify the password to login on VM


  --vm-key-file VM_KEY_FILE


                        Specify an identity file with a private key instead of


                        a password (Example: .pem files from Amazon EC2)


  --vm-cleanup          Restore VM to a previous state, before running tests


  --vm-timeout SECONDS  Amount of time (in seconds) to wait for a successful


                        connection to the virtual machine. Defaults to 120


                        seconds.
wrapper support:


  --wrapper SCRIPT[:EXECUTABLE]


                        Use a script to wrap executables run by a test. The


                        wrapper is either a path to a script (AKA a global


                        wrapper) or a path to a script followed by colon


                        symbol (:), plus a shell like glob to the target


                        EXECUTABLE. Multiple wrapper options are allowed, but


                        only one global wrapper can be defined.
yaml to mux options:


  -m [FILE [FILE ...]], --mux-yaml [FILE [FILE ...]]


                        Location of one or more Avocado multiplex (.yaml)


                        FILE(s) (order dependent)


  --mux-filter-only [MUX_FILTER_ONLY [MUX_FILTER_ONLY ...]]


                        Filter only path(s) from multiplexing


  --mux-filter-out [MUX_FILTER_OUT [MUX_FILTER_OUT ...]]


                        Filter out path(s) from multiplexing


  --mux-path [MUX_PATH [MUX_PATH ...]]


                        List of default paths used to determine path priority


                        when querying for parameters


  --mux-inject [MUX_INJECT [MUX_INJECT ...]]


                        Inject [path:]key:node values into the final multiplex


                        tree.

Options for subcommand config (avocado config --help):

optional arguments:


  -h, --help            show this help message and exit


  --datadir             Shows the data directories currently being used by


                        avocado


  --paginator {on,off}  Turn the paginator on/off. Current: on

Options for subcommand diff (avocado diff --help):

positional arguments:


  <JOB>                 A job reference, identified by a (partial) unique ID


                        (SHA1) or test results directory.
optional arguments:


  -h, --help            show this help message and exit


  --html FILE           Enable HTML output to the FILE where the result should


                        be written.


  --open-browser        Generate and open a HTML report in your preferred


                        browser. If no --html file is provided, create a


                        temporary file.


  --diff-filter DIFF_FILTER


                        Comma separated filter of diff sections:


                        (no)cmdline,(no)time,(no)variants,(no)results,


                        (no)config,(no)sysinfo (defaults to all enabled).


  --paginator {on,off}  Turn the paginator on/off. Current: on


  --create-reports      Create temporary files with job reports (to be used by


                        other diff tools)

Options for subcommand distro (avocado distro --help):

optional arguments:


  -h, --help            show this help message and exit


  --distro-def-create   Creates a distro definition file based on the path


                        given


  --distro-def-name DISTRO_DEF_NAME


                        Distribution short name


  --distro-def-version DISTRO_DEF_VERSION


                        Distribution major version number


  ---distro-def-release DISTRO_DEF_RELEASE


                        Distribution release version number


  --distro-def-arch DISTRO_DEF_ARCH


                        Primary architecture that the distro targets


  --distro-def-path DISTRO_DEF_PATH


                        Top level directory of the distro installation files


  --distro-def-type {deb,rpm}


                        Distro type (one of: deb, rpm)

Options for subcommand exec-path (avocado exec-path --help):

optional arguments:


  -h, --help  show this help message and exit

Options for subcommand list (avocado list --help):

positional arguments:


  reference             List of test references (aliases or paths). If empty,


                        avocado will list tests on the configured test source,


                        (see 'avocado config --datadir') Also, if there are


                        other test loader plugins active, tests from those


                        plugins might also show up (behavior may vary among


                        plugins)
optional arguments:


  -h, --help            show this help message and exit


  -V, --verbose         Whether to show extra information (headers and


                        summary). Current: False


  --paginator {on,off}  Turn the paginator on/off. Current: on
loader options:


  --loaders [LOADERS [LOADERS ...]]


                        Overrides the priority of the test loaders. You can


                        specify either @loader_name or TEST_TYPE. By default


                        it tries all available loaders according to priority


                        set in settings->plugins.loaders.


  --external-runner EXECUTABLE


                        Path to an specific test runner that allows the use of


                        its own tests. This should be used for running tests


                        that do not conform to Avocado' SIMPLE testinterface


                        and can not run standalone. Note: the use of


                        --external-runner overwrites the --loaders to


                        "external_runner"


  --external-runner-chdir {runner,test}


                        Change directory before executing tests. This option


                        may be necessary because of requirements and/or


                        limitations of the external test runner. If the


                        external runner requires to be run from its own base


                        directory,use "runner" here. If the external runner


                        runs tests based on files and requires to be run from


                        the directory where those files are located, use


                        "test" here and specify the test directory with the


                        option "--external-runner-testdir". Defaults to "None"


  --external-runner-testdir DIRECTORY


                        Where test files understood by the external test


                        runner are located in the filesystem. Obviously this


                        assumes and only applies to external test runners that


                        run tests from files
filtering parameters:


  --filter-by-tags TAGS


                        Filter INSTRUMENTED tests based on ":avocado:


                        tags=tag1,tag2" notation in their class docstring


  --filter-by-tags-include-empty


                        Include all tests without tags during filtering. This


                        effectively means they will be kept in the test suite


                        found previously to filtering.

Options for subcommand multiplex (avocado multiplex --help):

optional arguments:


  -h, --help            show this help message and exit


  --summary SUMMARY     Verbosity of the variants summary. (positive integer -


                        0, 1, ... - or none, brief, normal, verbose, full,


                        max)


  --variants VARIANTS   Verbosity of the list of variants. (positive integer -


                        0, 1, ... - or none, brief, normal, verbose, full,


                        max)


  --system-wide         Combine the files with the default tree.


  -c, --contents        [obsoleted by --variants] Shows the node content


                        (variables)
environment view options:


  -d, --debug           Debug the multiplex tree.
tree view options:


  -t, --tree            [obsoleted by --summary] Shows the multiplex tree


                        structure


  -i, --inherit         [obsoleted by --summary] Show the inherited values
yaml to mux options:


  -m [FILE [FILE ...]], --mux-yaml [FILE [FILE ...]]


                        Location of one or more Avocado multiplex (.yaml)


                        FILE(s) (order dependent)


  --mux-filter-only [MUX_FILTER_ONLY [MUX_FILTER_ONLY ...]]


                        Filter only path(s) from multiplexing


  --mux-filter-out [MUX_FILTER_OUT [MUX_FILTER_OUT ...]]


                        Filter out path(s) from multiplexing


  --mux-path [MUX_PATH [MUX_PATH ...]]


                        List of default paths used to determine path priority


                        when querying for parameters


  --mux-inject [MUX_INJECT [MUX_INJECT ...]]


                        Inject [path:]key:node values into the final multiplex


                        tree.

Options for subcommand plugins (avocado plugins --help):

optional arguments:


  -h, --help            show this help message and exit


  --paginator {on,off}  Turn the paginator on/off. Current: on

Options for subcommand sysinfo (avocado sysinfo --help):

positional arguments:


  sysinfodir  Dir where to dump sysinfo
optional arguments:


  -h, --help  show this help message and exit

RUNNING A TEST¶

The most common use of the avocado command line tool is to run a test:

$ avocado run sleeptest.py

This command will run the sleeptest.py test, as found on the standard test directories. The output should be similar to:

JOB ID    : <id>
JOB LOG   : /home/<user>/avocado/job-results/job-<date>-<shortid>/job.log


 (1/1) sleeptest.py:SleepTest.test: PASS (1.01 s)
RESULTS    : PASS 1 | ERROR 0 | FAIL 0 | SKIP 0 | WARN 0 | INTERRUPT 0
JOB TIME   : 1.11 s

The test directories will vary depending on you system and installation method used. Still, it's pretty easy to find that out as shown in the next section.

DEBUGGING TESTS¶

When you are developing new tests, frequently you want to look at the straight output of the job log in the stdout, without having to tail the job log. In order to do that, you can use --show-job-log to the avocado test runner:

$ scripts/avocado run examples/tests/sleeptest.py --show-job-log
...
PARAMS (key=timeout, path=*, default=None) => None
START 1-sleeptest.py:SleepTest.test
PARAMS (key=sleep_length, path=*, default=1) => 1
Sleeping for 1.00 seconds
Not logging /var/log/messages (lack of permissions)
PASS 1-sleeptest.py:SleepTest.test
...

Let's say you are debugging a test particularly large, with lots of debug output and you want to reduce this output to only messages with level 'INFO' and higher. You can set job-log-level to info to reduce the amount of output.

Edit your ~/.config/avocado/avocado.conf file and add:

[job.output]
loglevel = info

Running the same example with this option will give you:

$ scripts/avocado run sleeptest --show-job-log
...
START 1-sleeptest.py:SleepTest.test
PASS 1-sleeptest.py:SleepTest.test
...

The levels you can choose are the levels available in the python logging system https://docs.python.org/2/library/logging.html#logging-levels, translated to lowercase strings, so 'notset', 'debug', 'info', 'warning', 'error', 'critical', in order of severity.

As you can see, the UI output is suppressed and only the job log goes to stdout, making this a useful feature for test development/debugging.

SILENCING RUNNER STDOUT¶

You may specify --silent, that means avocado will turn off all runner stdout. Even if you specify things like --show-job-log in the CLI, --silent will have precedence and you will not get application stdout. Note that --silent does not affect on disk job logs, those continue to be generated normally.

SILENCING SYSINFO REPORT¶

You may specify --sysinfo=off and avocado will not collect profilers, hardware details and other system information, inside the job result directory.

LISTING TESTS¶

The avocado command line tool also has a list command, that lists the known tests in a given path, be it a path to an individual test, or a path to a directory. If no arguments provided, avocado will inspect the contents of the test location being used by avocado (if you are in doubt about which one is that, you may use avocado config --datadir). The output looks like:

$ avocado list
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/abort.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/datadir.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/doublefail.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/doublefree.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/errortest.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/failtest.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/fiotest.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/gdbtest.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/gendata.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/linuxbuild.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/multiplextest.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/passtest.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/skiptest.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/sleeptenmin.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/sleeptest.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/synctest.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/timeouttest.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/warntest.py
INSTRUMENTED /usr/share/doc/avocado/tests/whiteboard.py

Here, INSTRUMENTED means that the files there are python files with an avocado test class in them, therefore, that they are what we call instrumented tests. This means those tests can use all avocado APIs and facilities. Let's try to list a directory with a bunch of executable shell scripts:

$ avocado list examples/wrappers/
SIMPLE examples/wrappers/dummy.sh
SIMPLE examples/wrappers/ltrace.sh
SIMPLE examples/wrappers/perf.sh
SIMPLE examples/wrappers/strace.sh
SIMPLE examples/wrappers/time.sh
SIMPLE examples/wrappers/valgrind.sh

Here, SIMPLE means that those files are executables, that avocado will simply execute and return PASS or FAIL depending on their return codes (PASS -> 0, FAIL -> any integer different than 0). You can also provide the --verbose, or -V flag to display files that were detected but are not avocado tests, along with summary information:

$ avocado list examples/gdb-prerun-scripts/ -V
Type       Test                                     Tag(s)
NOT_A_TEST examples/gdb-prerun-scripts/README
NOT_A_TEST examples/gdb-prerun-scripts/pass-sigusr1
TEST TYPES SUMMARY
==================
SIMPLE: 0
INSTRUMENTED: 0
MISSING: 0
NOT_A_TEST: 2

That summarizes the basic commands you should be using more frequently when you start with avocado. Let's talk now about how avocado stores test results.

EXPLORING RESULTS¶

When avocado runs tests, it saves all its results on your system:

JOB ID    : <id>
JOB LOG   : /home/<user>/avocado/job-results/job-<date>-<shortid>/job.log

For your convenience, avocado maintains a link to the latest job run (an avocado run command in this context), so you can always use "latest" to browse your test results:

$ ls /home/<user>/avocado/job-results/latest
id
jobdata
job.log
results.json
results.tap
results.xml
sysinfo
test-results

The main log file is job.log, but every test has its own results directory:

$ ls -1 ~/avocado/job-results/latest/test-results/
1-sleeptest.py:SleepTest.test

Since this is a directory, it should have content similar to:

$ ls -1 ~/avocado/job-results/latest/test-results/1-sleeptest.py\:SleepTest.test/
data
debug.log
remote.log
stderr
stdout
sysinfo
whiteboard

MULTIPLEX¶

Avocado has a powerful tool that enables multiple test scenarios to be run using a single, unmodified test. This mechanism uses a YAML file called the 'multiplex file', that tells avocado how to multiply all possible test scenarios automatically.

A command by the same name, multiplex, is available on the avocado command line tool, and enables you to see all the test scenarios that can be run:

$ avocado multiplex -m examples/tests/sleeptest.py.data/sleeptest.yaml -c
Variants generated:
Variant 1:    /run/short


    /run/short:sleep_length => 0.5
Variant 2:    /run/medium


    /run/medium:sleep_length => 1
Variant 3:    /run/long


    /run/long:sleep_length => 5
Variant 4:    /run/longest


    /run/longest:sleep_length => 10

This is a sample that varies the parameter sleep_length through the scenarios /run/short (sleeps for 0.5 s), /run/medium (sleeps for 1 s), /run/long (sleeps for 5s), /run/longest (sleeps for 10s). The YAML file (multiplex file) that produced the output above is:

!mux
short:


    sleep_length: 0.5
medium:


    sleep_length: 1
long:


    sleep_length: 5
longest:


    sleep_length: 10

You can execute sleeptest in all variations exposed above with:

$ avocado run sleeptest.py -m examples/tests/sleeptest.py.data/sleeptest.yaml

And the output should look like:

JOB ID    : <id>
JOB LOG   : /home/<user>/avocado/job-results/job-<date>-<shortid>/job.log


 (1/4) sleeptest.py:SleepTest.test;1: PASS (0.51 s)


 (2/4) sleeptest.py:SleepTest.test;2: PASS (1.01 s)


 (3/4) sleeptest.py:SleepTest.test;3: PASS (5.02 s)


 (4/4) sleeptest.py:SleepTest.test;4: PASS (10.01 s)
RESULTS    : PASS 4 | ERROR 0 | FAIL 0 | SKIP 0 | WARN 0 | INTERRUPT 0
JOB TIME   : 16.65 s

The multiplex plugin and the test runner supports two kinds of global filters, through the command line options --mux-filter-only and --mux-filter-out. The mux-filter-only exclusively includes one or more paths and the mux-filter-out removes one or more paths from being processed.

From the previous example, if we are interested to use the variants /run/medium and /run/longest, we do the following command line:

$ avocado run sleeptest.py -m examples/tests/sleeptest.py.data/sleeptest.yaml \


      --mux-filter-only /run/medium /run/longest

And if you want to remove /small from the variants created, we do the following:

$ avocado run sleeptest.py -m examples/tests/sleeptest.py.data/sleeptest.yaml \


      --mux-filter-out /run/medium

Note that both --mux-filter-only and --mux-filter-out filters can be arranged in the same command line.

The multiplexer also supports default paths. The base path is /run/* but it can be overridden by --mux-path, which accepts multiple arguments. What it does: it splits leaves by the provided paths. Each query goes one by one through those sub-trees and first one to hit the match returns the result. It might not solve all problems, but it can help to combine existing YAML files with your ones:

qa: # large and complex read-only file, content injected into /qa


    tests:


        timeout: 10


    ...
my_variants: !mux # your YAML file injected into /my_variants


    short:


        timeout: 1


    long:


        timeout: 1000

You want to use an existing test which uses params.get('timeout', '*'). Then you can use --mux-path '/my_variants/*' '/qa/*' and it'll first look in your variants. If no matches are found, then it would proceed to /qa/*

Keep in mind that only slices defined in mux-path are taken into account for relative paths (the ones starting with *).

DEBUGGING EXECUTABLES RUN AS PART OF A TEST¶

One interesting avocado feature is the ability to automatically and transparently run executables that are used on a given test inside the GNU debugger.

Suppose you are running a test that uses an external, compiled, image converter. Now suppose you're feeding it with different types of images, including broken image files, and it fails at a given point. You wish you could connect to the debugger at that given source location while your test is running. This is how to do just that with avocado:

$ avocado run --gdb-run-bin=convert:convert_ppm_to_raw converttest.py

The job starts running just as usual, and so does your test:

JOB ID    : <id>
JOB LOG   : /home/<user>/avocado/job-results/job-<date>-<shortid>/job.log
TESTS     : 1


 (1/1) converttest.py:ConvertTest.test: /

The convert executable though, automatically runs inside GDB. Avocado will stop when the given breakpoint is reached:

TEST PAUSED because of debugger breakpoint. To DEBUG your application run:
/home/<user>/avocado/job-results/job-<date>-<shortid>/test-results/converttest.py/data/convert.gdb.sh
NOTE: please use *disconnect* command in gdb before exiting, or else the debugged process will be KILLED

From this point, you can run the generated script (convert.gdb.sh) to debug you application.

As noted, it is strongly recommended that you disconnect from gdb while your executable is still running. That is, if the executable finished running while you are debugging it, avocado has no way to know about its status.

Avocado will automatically send a continue command to the debugger when you disconnect from and exit gdb.

If, for some reason you have a custom GDB, or your system does not put GDB on what avocado believes to be the standard location (/usr/bin/gdb), you can override that in the section gdb.paths of your documentation:

[gdb.paths]
gdb = /usr/bin/gdb
gdbserver = /usr/bin/gdbserver

So running avocado after setting those will use the appropriate gdb/gdbserver path.

If you are debugging a special application and need to setup GDB in custom ways by running GDB commands, you can do that with the --gdb-prerun-commands option:

$ avocado run --gdb-run-bin=foo:bar --gdb-prerun-commands=/tmp/disable-signals footest.py

In this example, /tmp/disable-signals is a simple text file containing two lines:

signal SIGUSR1 pass
signal SIGUSR1 nostop

Each line is a GDB command, so you can have from simple to very complex debugging environments configured like that.

WRAP EXECUTABLE RUN BY TESTS¶

Avocado allows the instrumentation of executables being run by a test in a transparent way. The user specifies a script ("the wrapper") to be used to run the actual program called by the test.

If the instrumentation script is implemented correctly, it should not interfere with the test behavior. That is, the wrapper should avoid changing the return status, standard output and standard error messages of the original executable.

The user can be specific about which program to wrap (with a shell-like glob), or if that is omitted, a global wrapper that will apply to all programs called by the test.

So, for every executable run by the test, the program name will be compared to the pattern to decide whether to wrap it or not. You can have multiples wrappers and patterns defined.

Examples:

$ avocado run datadir.py --wrapper examples/wrappers/strace.sh

Any command created by the test datadir will be wrapped on strace.sh.

$ avocado run datadir.py --wrapper examples/wrappers/ltrace.sh:*make \


                         --wrapper examples/wrappers/perf.sh:*datadir

Any command that matches the pattern *make will be wrapper on ltrace.sh and the pattern *datadir will trigger the execution of perf.sh.

Note that it is not possible to use --gdb-run-bin together with --wrapper, they are incompatible.

RUNNING TESTS WITH AN EXTERNAL RUNNER¶

It's quite common to have organically grown test suites in most software projects. These usually include a custom built, very specific test runner that knows how to find and run their own tests.

Still, running those tests inside Avocado may be a good idea for various reasons, including being able to have results in different human and machine readable formats, collecting system information alongside those tests (the Avocado's sysinfo functionality), and more.

Avocado makes that possible by means of its "external runner" feature. The most basic way of using it is:

$ avocado run --external-runner=/path/to/external_runner foo bar baz

In this example, Avocado will report individual test results for tests foo, bar and baz. The actual results will be based on the return code of individual executions of /path/to/external_runner foo, /path/to/external_runner bar and finally /path/to/external_runner baz.

As another way to explain an show how this feature works, think of the "external runner" as some kind of interpreter and the individual tests as anything that this interpreter recognizes and is able to execute. A UNIX shell, say /bin/sh could be considered an external runner, and files with shell code could be considered tests:

$ echo "exit 0" > /tmp/pass
$ echo "exit 1" > /tmp/fail
$ avocado run --external-runner=/bin/sh /tmp/pass /tmp/fail
JOB ID    : <id>
JOB LOG   : /home/<user>/avocado/job-results/job-<date>-<shortid>/job.log
TESTS      : 2
(1/2) /tmp/pass: PASS (0.01 s)
(2/2) /tmp/fail: FAIL (0.01 s)
RESULTS    : PASS 1 | ERROR 0 | FAIL 1 | SKIP 0 | WARN 0 | INTERRUPT 0
JOB TIME   : 0.11 s

This example is pretty obvious, and could be achieved by giving /tmp/pass and /tmp/fail shell "shebangs" (#!/bin/sh), making them executable (chmod +x /tmp/pass /tmp/fail), and running them as "SIMPLE" tests.

But now consider the following example:

$ avocado run --external-runner=/bin/curl http://local-avocado-server:9405/jobs/ \


                                          http://remote-avocado-server:9405/jobs/
JOB ID    : <id>
JOB LOG   : /home/<user>/avocado/job-results/job-<date>-<shortid>/job.log
TESTS      : 2
(1/2) http://local-avocado-server:9405/jobs/: PASS (0.02 s)
(2/2) http://remote-avocado-server:9405/jobs/: FAIL (3.02 s)
RESULTS    : PASS 1 | ERROR 0 | FAIL 1 | SKIP 0 | WARN 0 | INTERRUPT 0
JOB TIME   : 3.14 s

This effectively makes /bin/curl an "external test runner", responsible for trying to fetch those URLs, and reporting PASS or FAIL for each of them.

RECORDING TEST REFERENCE OUTPUT¶

As a tester, you may want to check if the output of a given application matches an expected output. In order to help with this common use case, we offer the option --output-check-record [mode] to the test runner. If this option is used, it will store the stdout or stderr of the process (or both, if you specified all) being executed to reference files: stdout.expected and stderr.expected.

Those files will be recorded in the test data dir. The data dir is in the same directory as the test source file, named [source_file_name.data]. Let's take as an example the test synctest.py. In a fresh checkout of avocado, you can see:

examples/tests/synctest.py.data/stderr.expected
examples/tests/synctest.py.data/stdout.expected

From those 2 files, only stdout.expected is non empty:

$ cat examples/tests/synctest.py.data/stdout.expected
PAR : waiting
PASS : sync interrupted

The output files were originally obtained using the test runner and passing the option --output-check-record all to the test runner:

$ avocado run --output-check-record all examples/tests/synctest.py
JOB ID    : <id>
JOB LOG   : /home/<user>/avocado/job-results/job-<date>-<shortid>/job.log


 (1/1) examples/tests/synctest.py:SyncTest.test: PASS (4.00 s)
RESULTS    : PASS 1 | ERROR 0 | FAIL 0 | SKIP 0 | WARN 0 | INTERRUPT 0
JOB TIME   : 4.10 s

After the reference files are added, the check process is transparent, in the sense that you do not need to provide special flags to the test runner. Now, every time the test is executed, after it is done running, it will check if the outputs are exactly right before considering the test as PASSed. If you want to override the default behavior and skip output check entirely, you may provide the flag --output-check=off to the test runner.

The avocado.utils.process APIs have a parameter allow_output_check (defaults to all), so that you can select which process outputs will go to the reference files, should you chose to record them. You may choose all, for both stdout and stderr, stdout, for the stdout only, stderr, for only the stderr only, or none, to allow neither of them to be recorded and checked.

This process works fine also with simple tests, executables that return 0 (PASSed) or != 0 (FAILed). Let's consider our bogus example:

$ cat output_record.sh
#!/bin/bash
echo "Hello, world!"

Let's record the output (both stdout and stderr) for this one:

$ avocado run output_record.sh --output-check-record all
JOB ID    : <id>
JOB LOG   : /home/<user>/avocado/job-results/job-<date>-<shortid>/job.log
TESTS     : 1
(1/1) home/$USER/Code/avocado/output_record.sh: PASS (0.01 s)
RESULTS    : PASS 1 | ERROR 0 | FAIL 0 | SKIP 0 | WARN 0 | INTERRUPT 0
JOB TIME   : 0.11 s

After this is done, you'll notice that a the test data directory appeared in the same level of our shell script, containing 2 files:

$ ls output_record.sh.data/
stderr.expected  stdout.expected

Let's look what's in each of them:

$ cat output_record.sh.data/stdout.expected
Hello, world!
$ cat output_record.sh.data/stderr.expected
$

Now, every time this test runs, it'll take into account the expected files that were recorded, no need to do anything else but run the test.

RUNNING REMOTE TESTS¶

Avocado allows you to execute tests on a remote machine by means of a SSH network connection. The remote machine must be configured to accept remote connections and the Avocado framework have to be installed in both origin and remote machines.

When running tests on remote machine, the test sources and its data (if any present) are transferred to the remote target, just before the test execution. After the test execution, all test results are transferred back to the origin machine.

Here is how to run the sleeptest example test in a remote machine with IP address 192.168.0.123 (standard port 22), remote user name fedora and remote user password 123456:

$ avocado run sleeptest.py --remote-hostname 192.168.0.123 --remote-username fedora --remote-password 123456

The output should look like:

JOB ID    : <id>
JOB LOG   : /home/<user>/avocado/job-results/job-<date>-<shortid>/job.log
LOGIN      : fedora@localhost:22 (TIMEOUT: 60 seconds)


 (1/1) sleeptest.py:SleepTest.test: PASS (1.02 s)
RESULTS    : PASS 1 | ERROR 0 | FAIL 0 | SKIP 0 | WARN 0 | INTERRUPT 0
JOB TIME   : 1.12 s

For more information, please consult the topic Remote Machine Plugin on Avocado's online documentation.

LINUX DISTRIBUTION UTILITIES¶

Avocado has some planned features that depend on knowing the Linux Distribution being used on the system. The most basic command prints the detected Linux Distribution:

$ avocado distro
Detected distribution: fedora (x86_64) version 21 release 0

Other features are available with the same command when command line options are given, as shown by the --help option.

For instance, it possible to create a so-called "Linux Distribution Definition" file, by inspecting an installation tree. The installation tree could be the contents of the official installation ISO or a local network mirror.

These files let Avocado pinpoint if a given installed package is part of the original Linux Distribution or something else that was installed from an external repository or even manually. This, in turn, can help detecting regressions in base system pacakges that affected a given test result.

To generate a definition file run:

$ avocado distro --distro-def-create --distro-def-name avocadix  \


                 --distro-def-version 1 --distro-def-arch x86_64 \


                 --distro-def-type rpm --distro-def-path /mnt/dvd

And the output will be something like:

Loading distro information from tree... Please wait...
Distro information saved to "avocadix-1-x86_64.distro"

FILES¶

System wide configuration file


    /etc/avocado/avocado.conf
Extra configuration files


    /etc/avocado/conf.d/
User configuration file


    ~/.config/avocado/avocado.conf

BUGS¶

If you find a bug, please report it over our github page as an issue: https://github.com/avocado-framework/avocado/issues

LICENSE¶

Avocado is released under GPLv2 (explicit version) http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl-2.0.html. Even though most of the current code is licensed under a "and any later version" clause, some parts are specifically bound to the version 2 of the license and therefore that's the official license of the prject itself. For more details, please see the LICENSE file in the project source code directory.

MORE INFORMATION¶

For more information please check Avocado's project website, located at http://avocado-framework.github.io/. There you'll find links to online documentation, source code and community resources.

AUTHOR¶

Avocado Development Team <avocado-devel@redhat.com>

Source file:	avocado.1.en.gz (from avocado-common 69.0-6.14)
Source last updated:	2021-04-29T13:22:11Z
Converted to HTML:	2024-04-29T01:22:16Z