Subject: Re: [PATCH] test-lib: introduce the '-V' short option for '--verbose-log'

From: SZEDER Gábor <[email-masked]>
Date: Mon, 29 Oct 2018 14:53:35 +0100

On Mon, Oct 29, 2018 at 10:21:08AM -0400, Jeff King wrote:
> On Mon, Oct 29, 2018 at 01:13:59PM +0100, SZEDER Gábor wrote:
> 
> > '--verbose-log' is one of the most useful and thus most frequently
> > used test options, but due to its length it's a pain to type on the
> > command line.
> > 
> > Let's introduce the corresponding short option '-V' to save some
> > keystrokes.
> 
> Interesting. I'm not opposed to something like this, but I added
> "--verbose-log" specifically for scripted cases, like running an
> unattended "prove" that needs to preserve stdout. When running
> individual tests, I'd just use "-v" itself, and possibly redirect the
> output.
> 
> For my curiosity, can you describe your use case a bit more?

Even when I run individual test scripts by hand, I prefer to have a
file catching all output of the test, because I don't like it when the
test output floods my terminal (especially with '-x'), and because the
file is searchable but the terminal isn't.  And that's exactly what
'--verbose-log' does.

Redirecting the '-v' output (i.e. stdout) alone is insufficient,
because any error messages within the tests and the '-x' trace go to
stderr, so they still end up on the terminal.  Therefore I would have
to remember to redirect stderr every time as well.

I find it's much easier to just always use '--verbose-log'... except
for the length of the option, that is, hence this patch.