Mailing List Archive

Call for contribution: cleanup ext/File-Find/t/{find,taint}.t (and other test files)
The tests for File::Find are pretty crufty, and IMO mix different
types of test in the same file in a way that makes the file hard to
understand and maintain. We had long running race conditions when run
in parallel for instance which I think I just fixed in
https://github.com/Perl/perl5/pull/20753.

IMO modernizing these test files is a perfect task for someone who
would like to contribute but doesn't feel comfortable working on the C
code-base. Anyone used to modern perl coding style could improve
these tests significantly. It's a small thing, but everything adds
up.

This does not just apply to File::Find, although IMO FF is a good
example of the problem, many of our ext/ and lib/ modules have crufty
and hard to understand and maintain tests, and could do with some
love. If you would like to contribute to the maintenance of the
language you could pick one at random and rewrite it to be clean,
commented and in a modern dialect of Perl.

Every little bit helps, pure-perl test code improvements and the like
would shift some of the maintenance load from the devs that are
comfortable in working on the C code so they can focus on stuff they
have particular expertise in, we have 2000+ issues, ~100 open PR's at
any one time so there is *always* something for us to do.

If other people outside the core team could contribute to the Perl
part of the code base it would free us up to other things and be a big
help in making the project move faster. It would also be a good way to
learn more about core development and maybe move on to hacking on the
C code itself. Because we target many different platforms it is also
a way to get some exposure to a wider range of build targets and the
issues that come with supporting many different operating systems, so
a good way to expand you knowledge and skill base.

I am available[1] should anyone need support in these kinds of
activities, but generally I would say that for any reasonably
experienced perl developer all that is required is time and effort.

Cheers,
Yves
[1] While I cant speak for anyone specifically, generally the rest of
the core perl devs are supportive of these kinds of initiative and
likely will be happy to advise or explain as needed.
--
perl -Mre=debug -e "/just|another|perl|hacker/"