6 my $app = App::Prove->new;
7 $app->process_args(@ARGV);
8 exit( $app->run ? 0 : 1 );
14 prove - Run tests through a TAP harness.
18 prove [options] [files or directories]
24 -v, --verbose Print all test lines.
25 -l, --lib Add 'lib' to the path for your tests (-Ilib).
26 -b, --blib Add 'blib/lib' and 'blib/arch' to the path for your tests
27 -s, --shuffle Run the tests in random order.
28 -c, --color Colored test output (default).
29 --nocolor Do not color test output.
30 -D --dry Dry run. Show test that would have run.
31 --ext Set the extension for tests (default '.t')
32 -f, --failures Only show failed tests.
33 --fork Fork to run harness in multiple processes.
34 --ignore-exit Ignore exit status from test scripts.
35 -m, --merge Merge test scripts' STDERR with their STDOUT.
36 -r, --recurse Recursively descend into directories.
37 --reverse Run the tests in reverse order.
38 -q, --quiet Suppress some test output while running tests.
39 -Q, --QUIET Only print summary results.
40 -p, --parse Show full list of TAP parse errors, if any.
41 --directives Only show results with TODO or SKIP directives.
42 --timer Print elapsed time after each test.
43 -T Enable tainting checks.
44 -t Enable tainting warnings.
45 -W Enable fatal warnings.
47 -h, --help Display this help
49 -H, --man Longer manpage for prove
50 --norc Don't process default .proverc
52 Options that take arguments:
54 -I Library paths to include.
55 -P Load plugin (searches App::Prove::Plugin::*.)
57 -e, --exec Interpreter to run the tests ('' for compiled tests.)
58 --harness Define test harness to use. See TAP::Harness.
59 --formatter Result formatter to use. See TAP::Harness.
60 -a, --archive Store the resulting TAP in an archive file.
61 -j, --jobs N Run N test jobs in parallel (try 9.)
62 --state=opts Control prove's persistent state.
63 --rc=rcfile Process options from rcfile
69 If F<~/.proverc> or F<./.proverc> exist they will be read and any
70 options they contain processed before the command line options. Options
71 in F<.proverc> are specified in the same way as command line options:
77 Additional option files may be specified with the C<--rc> option.
78 Default option file processing is disabled by the C<--norc> option.
80 Under Windows and VMS the option file is named F<_proverc> rather than
81 F<.proverc> and is sought only in the current directory.
83 =head2 Reading from C<STDIN>
85 If you have a list of tests (or URLs, or anything else you want to test) in a
86 file, you can add them to your tests by using a '-':
88 prove - < my_list_of_things_to_test.txt
90 See the C<README> in the C<examples> directory of this distribution.
92 =head2 Default Test Directory
94 If no files or directories are supplied, C<prove> looks for all files
95 matching the pattern C<t/*.t>.
97 =head2 Colored Test Output
99 Colored test output is the default, but if output is not to a
100 terminal, color is disabled. You can override this by adding the
103 Color support requires L<Term::ANSIColor> on Unix-like platforms and
104 L<Win32::Console> windows. If the necessary module is not installed
105 colored output will not be available.
107 =head2 Arguments to Tests
109 It is possible to supply arguments to tests. To do so separate them from
110 prove's own arguments with the arisdottle, '::'. For example
112 prove -v t/mytest.t :: --url http://example.com
114 would run F<t/mytest.t> with the options '--url http://example.com'.
115 When running multiple tests they will each receive the same arguments.
119 Normally you can just pass a list of Perl tests and the harness will know how
120 to execute them. However, if your tests are not written in Perl or if you
121 want all tests invoked exactly the same way, use the C<-e>, or C<--exec>
124 prove --exec '/usr/bin/ruby -w' t/
125 prove --exec '/usr/bin/perl -Tw -mstrict -Ilib' t/
126 prove --exec '/path/to/my/customer/exec'
130 If you need to make sure your diagnostics are displayed in the correct
131 order relative to test results you can use the C<--merge> option to
132 merge the test scripts' STDERR into their STDOUT.
134 This guarantees that STDOUT (where the test results appear) and STDOUT
135 (where the diagnostics appear) will stay in sync. The harness will
136 display any diagnostics your tests emit on STDERR.
138 Caveat: this is a bit of a kludge. In particular note that if anything
139 that appears on STDERR looks like a test result the test harness will
140 get confused. Use this option only if you understand the consequences
141 and can live with the risk.
145 You can ask C<prove> to remember the state of previous test runs and
146 select and/or order the tests to be run this time based on that
149 The C<--state> switch requires an argument which must be a comma
150 separated list of one or more of the following options.
156 Run the same tests as the last time the state was saved. This makes it
157 possible, for example, to recreate the ordering of a shuffled test.
159 # Run all tests in random order
160 $ prove -b --state=save --shuffle
162 # Run them again in the same order
163 $ prove -b --state=last
167 Run only the tests that failed on the last run.
170 $ prove -b --state=save
173 $ prove -b --state=failed
175 If you also specify the C<save> option newly passing tests will be
176 excluded from subsequent runs.
178 # Repeat until no more failures
179 $ prove -b --state=failed,save
183 Run only the passed tests from last time. Useful to make sure that no
184 new problems have been introduced.
188 Run all tests in normal order. Multple options may be specified, so to
189 run all tests with the failures from last time first:
191 $ prove -b --state=failed,all,save
195 Run the tests that most recently failed first. The last failure time of
196 each test is stored. The C<hot> option causes tests to be run in most-recent-
199 $ prove -b --state=hot,save
201 Tests that have never failed will not be selected. To run all tests with
202 the most recently failed first use
204 $ prove -b --state=hot,all,save
206 This combination of options may also be specified thus
208 $ prove -b --state=adrian
212 Run any tests with todos.
216 Run the tests in slowest to fastest order. This is useful in conjunction
217 with the C<-j> parallel testing switch to ensure that your slowest tests
220 $ prove -b --state=slow -j9
224 Run test tests in fastest to slowest order.
228 Run the tests in newest to oldest order.
232 Run the tests in oldest to newest order.
236 Save the state on exit. The state is stored in a file called F<.prove>
237 (F<_prove> on Windows and VMS) in the current directory.
241 The C<--state> switch may be used more than once.
243 $ prove -b --state=hot --state=all,save
247 Normally when a Perl program is run in taint mode the contents of the
248 C<PERL5LIB> environment variable do not appear in C<@INC>.
250 Because C<PERL5LIB> is often used during testing to add build directories
251 to C<@INC> prove (actually L<TAP::Parser::Source::Perl>) passes the
252 names of any directories found in C<PERL5LIB> as -I switches. The net
253 effect of this is that C<PERL5LIB> is honoured even when prove is run in
258 # vim:ts=4:sw=4:et:sta