Re: [PATCH v2 03/16] tests/Makefile.include: add binary dependency to run-tcg-tests-% rules

["Alex Bennée" <alex.bennee@linaro.org>]

Pierrick Bouvier <pierrick.bouvier@oss.qualcomm.com> writes:

> On 5/26/2026 10:58 AM, Alex Bennée wrote:
>> Pierrick Bouvier <pierrick.bouvier@oss.qualcomm.com> writes:
>> 
>>> On 5/26/2026 3:47 AM, Alex Bennée wrote:
>>>> Pierrick Bouvier <pierrick.bouvier@oss.qualcomm.com> writes:
>>>>
>>>>> On 5/25/2026 11:43 AM, Alex Bennée wrote:
>>>>>> Pierrick Bouvier <pierrick.bouvier@oss.qualcomm.com> writes:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> On 5/25/2026 8:46 AM, Pierrick Bouvier wrote:
>>>>>>>> On 5/23/2026 1:56 AM, Alex Bennée wrote:
>>>>>>>>> Pierrick Bouvier <pierrick.bouvier@oss.qualcomm.com> writes:
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>> On 5/22/2026 12:02 PM, Alex Bennée wrote:
>>>>>>>>>>> Pierrick Bouvier <pierrick.bouvier@oss.qualcomm.com> writes:
>>>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>>>> On 5/21/2026 6:17 AM, Alex Bennée wrote:
<snip>
>>>
>>> We'll need to remove the mechanic to build cross compilers containers.
>>> In my experience, it's clunky anyway and fails when building several
>>> from scratch. Try it yourself after cleaning your docker/podman images.
>>> It's just better and simpler to expect user to install cross
>>> compilers.
>> 
>> That would loose a bunch of functionality and doesn't help users running
>> anything that isn't Debian.
>>
>
> Out of fedora, who does it exclude?

RHEL, CentOS, SuSE

The cross compiler situation may have improved since - Debian has always
been ahead of the curve in its multi-arch support.

> We can still provide a fat debian container with all cross compilers
> embedded for people who don't run ubuntu/debian.
>
>>> The only thing that prevented me to implement this before is that I
>>> didn't know if concerned maintainers would accept it, or just hold onto
>>> the precious handcrafted Makefiles, into which so much energy and time
>>> has been spent.
>> 
>> There is no desire to hold onto Makefiles, but I do want to keep the
>> same capabilities as the current system. The driver for containerising
>> the compilers was that setting up cross compilers is a barrier to
>> contributors who want to be able to add and build tests.
>>
>
> Personally, this "smart" layer has been a barrier even on Debian, since
> by default it tries to build them, and it fails from scratch.
> Give it a try by purging your docker images, and run a make check-tcg
> -j$(nproc). I doubt anyone is really running check-tcg with this in real
> life.

What do you mean? I run check-tcg all the time.

Which containers fail to build for you? The main cross-compiler one
(debian-all-test-cross) is built all the time.

> But well, if the cross-container thing is *really* a blocker, we can
> just wrap build and run in a script per cross compiler, that does
> docker/podman build && docker/podman run and call that.

We still have the remnants of that in the docker.py script although for
most containers we moved to invoking docker (or podman) directly.

Also bear in mind the containers are also used to cross build QEMU
itself. 

>
> Now we solved the problem with system tests, and cross compilers, is
> there another thing that is absolutely needed from Makefiles?
>
>>> If it's not the case, then we should definitely move into the direction
>>> of migrating all this to meson, and rely on meson tests infrastructure.
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>> Pierrick
>> 

-- 
Alex Bennée
Virtualisation Tech Lead @ Linaro