[Nmh-workers] new test-show tests broken

[Paul Fox]

it turns out that introducing test cases for the show command has
exposed a possible failing of the nmh test infrastructure.

the tests carefully construct a self-contained test environment, with
all the executables and test case data down under a ./test/testdir
subdirectory.  PATH is set to reference these executables.

it all works very nicely, until show tries to invoke mhshow.  it does
so using nmhbindir(), which returns a hard-coded copy of the
configured install path.  if nmh has never been installed on the
machine where the test is being run (i.e., no "make install" has
happened), then show won't find /usr/local/bin/mhshow (/usr/local/bin
is the default install path), and the test-show will fail.  or, if
"make install" _has_ been done before for a different version of nmh,
the tests will run a newer local show command along an older
/usr/local/bin/mhshow, and the test may or may not work.

this explains why the buildbots are mostly failing right now, and
also, david, why your tests are failing.

my tests have all been working because i did an early install of
the show/mhshow tests, for dogfooding purposes.

lots of programs use nmhbindir().  i'm skeptical that none have ever
had test coverage, but that may be so.

i'll investigate further, but maybe this issue has come up before.

paul
=----------------------
 paul fox, address@hidden (arlington, ma, where it's 9.1 degrees)