$Id: pretesting_grass.txt,v 1.2 2002/01/22 04:50:48 glynn Exp $


Step by step procedures for our pre-testers:

For Testing the Source Code

1.  Download and unpack the new distribution into a new directory

2.  Run configure with a prefix set for a directory where grass was never
    installed before (see the INSTALL file for providing options to
    configure)
   
3.  Run make and capture the output to a file (see the INSTALL file for
    instructions on how to capture the output to a file)

4.  Check the output of the file "error.log" for any modules that failed to 
    compile. If errors were found, use the search function in your editor to
    find the error message in the log file generated during the Make from
    step 3. Please submit the errors to our bug report web page 
    (http://grass.itc.it/bugtracking/bugreport.html). Please
    ensure that you check if a bug has already been reported. Note that if a
    library failed to compile (a module with the path src/libes/ in it) then
    it most likely will cause several other modules to fail. Thus, you may
    want to take this into account when making your report. That is, it is
    probably not necessary to report modules that did not compile if a library
    failed to compile.
   
5.  Try to compile the optional software listed at the end of the output from
    the make command. Note that the absolute paths that are listed are
    necessary. Again, please submit any errors to our bug report web page 
    (http://grass.itc.it/bugtracking/bugreport.html). Please
    ensure that you check if a bug has already been reported.
    
6.  If errors were minimal, check if GRASS runs. Unfortunately, a test script
    does not exist yet, however, you should at least check the following
    programs:
       
        d.mon
        d.rast
        d.vect
        d.site
        d.zoom
        g.region
        tcltkgrass
        nviz
    
    and any other programs you typically use in your daily work with GRASS.
    To perform this test, start GRASS within the source directory (replace
    $ARCH with your architecture):
        
	bin.$ARCH/grass5

    For example:
       
        bin.i686-pc-linux-gnu/grass5

    This will allow you to test the above modules without having to install
    GRASS. Again, please submit any errors to our bug report web page 
    (http://grass.itc.it/bugtracking/bugreport.html). Please
    ensure that you check if a bug has already been reported.
    
7.  Check that the different start modes of GRASS work. That is, run the
    commands:
        
	bin.$ARCH/grass5 -text
	bin.$ARCH/grass5 -tcltk
	
8.  Run the "make install" command to install GRASS into the final
    destination

9.  Check if the installation of GRASS runs by running the command
    $prefix/bin/grass5 where $prefix is the path specified on the configure
    command line in step 2, or /usr/local if the prefix was not set in step 2.
    Perform the same tests as in steps 6 and 7.
    
10. Run the "make uninstall" command and check that GRASS was uninstalled
    from the destination directory

11. Run the "make distclean" command to clean off the object and configuration
    files generated during the compilation process

12. Please submit any errors to our bug report web page 
    (http://grass.itc.it/bugtracking/bugreport.html). Please
    ensure that you check if a bug has already been reported.

13. If no problems occured then please email the grass developers mailing list
    (if you are a member) or Markus Neteler (neteler@itc.it) and
    indicate that GRASS was successfully installed. Please include your
    platform as well as the compiler you used.


For Testing the Binary Distributions

1.  Download the distribution and the grass5install.sh script in a new
    directory

2.  Run the grass5install.sh script. Use "grass5install.sh -help" for a usage
    message. Please note the instructions printed when the script is finished
    that indicate how to uninstall GRASS. You will need these in step 4 below.
    
3.  Perform steps 6 and 7 in the above procedure for testing source code
    distributions
    
4.  Run grass5uninstall.sh to uninstall the binary package.
