how to test changes to packaging code

[Zooko O'Whielacronx]

Folks:

At a Hack Fest, Daira was asking me about something. She mentioned how
our policy requires unit tests to accompany any patches that change
behavior or fix bugs. And, she asked, what if the patch changes the
behavior of the build system, or fixes bugs in the packaging code — do
we make an exception for that case?

The answer is that we *do* require tests for changes to packaging
code, but those tests are not in the unit test directory, run by
trial, but are instead here:

https://tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe-lafs/browser/trunk/misc/build_helpers

Here are the three such tests that exist so far:

* https://tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe-lafs/browser/trunk/misc/build_helpers/test-dont-install-newer-dep-when-you-already-have-sufficiently-new-one.py
* https://tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe-lafs/browser/trunk/misc/build_helpers/test-dont-use-too-old-dep.py
* https://tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe-lafs/browser/trunk/misc/build_helpers/test-osx-pkg.py

Here are the tickets in which we settled on this policy:

* https://tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe-lafs/ticket/2049# Decide where
"packaging tests" should live.
* https://tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe-lafs/ticket/2050# Expand
HowToWriteTests to packaging and distribution tests
* https://tahoe-lafs.org/trac/tahoe-lafs/ticket/2077# pip packaging plan

Regards,

Zooko