Re: tests: always update generated tests silently

[Stefano Lattarini]

Hello Ralf.

On Saturday 15 January 2011, Ralf Wildenhues wrote:
> Reading the log files, I notice that I forgot to use
> --enable-silent-rules throughout, so that all the test generation is
> done verbosely and a bit annoying when reading the log files.  Now, even
> if I won't forget again, our users likely will.  Would you mind just
> generating them completely silently by default?
>
Honestly I'd mind, as I prefer to let the user decide, *and* to have
the rules being verbose by default.

As I wrote (or copied? I can't remember) in my pending documentation
patch on silent rules support:

 @cindex default verbosity for silent-rules
 Note that silent rules are @emph{disabled} by default; the user must
 enable them explicitly at either @command{configure} run time or at
 @command{make} run time.  We think that this is a good policy, since
 it provides the casual user with enough information to prepare a good
 bug report in case anything breaks.

Also, I like the automake silent-rules support because I can decide at
at any step what the verbosity is to be.  Just silencing some rules
unconditionally would IMHO be a step backward from the current
behaviour.

> Alternatively, we could prefix them with
>         @$(AM_V_GEN)
>         @$(AM_V_at)
>         ...
> 
> then in silent-rules mode the GEN line would still be output.
>
Yes please (if you really must silence the rules unconditionally,
of course).

> Or should we go the next step and use AM_SILENT_RULES([yes])?
>
Again from my pending documentation patch:

 Still, notwithstanding the rationales above, a developer who wants to
 make silent rules enabled by default in his own package can do so by
 adding a @samp{yes} argument to the @code{AM_SILENT_RULES} call in
 @file{configure.ac}.  We advise against this approach, though.

This advice should be changed if the automake's own build system starts
using AM_SILENT_RULES([yes]).  But I think it's a good advice as is ...

Anyway, going with AM_SILENT_RULES([yes]), while not good per se, would
probably be better than starting to silencing rules unconditionally.

> What do you think?
> 
> Thanks,
> Ralf
> 

Regards,
  Stefano