sorry one more question: assert statements in tests

[Reece Dunn]

On 10 July 2010 17:40, Misha Koshelev <misha680 at gmail.com> wrote:
> On Sat, 2010-07-10 at 07:40 +0100, Reece Dunn wrote:
>> On 10 July 2010 03:40, Misha Koshelev <misha680 at gmail.com> wrote:
> Ok that makes sense.
>
> What about in the case of something like this:
>
> /*
> http://www.cygnus-software.com/papers/comparingfloats/comparingfloats.htm
>  * "I think the answer is 10,000 but since floating point math is
> imperfect I’ll accept the maxUlps floats above and the maxUlps floats
> below that value." */
> static BOOLEAN AlmostEqual2sComplement(float A, float B, int maxUlps)
> {
>    int aInt, bInt, intDiff;
>    /* Make sure maxUlps is non-negative and small enough that the
>     * default NAN won't compare as equal to anything. */
>    assert(maxUlps > 0 && maxUlps < 4 * 1024 * 1024);
>
> Is assert ok here or do I need to change it to some kind of skip
> statement as well?

The assert should be ok here provided that maxUlps does not come from
some function -- that is, it is constant and will trigger on all
systems.

Assert statements are not forbidden in tests (there are some already
in various tests), it's just that if they trigger as a result of the
system as part of calls under test, they make it difficult to track
down what is failing and why by looking at the test results. If the
asserts are triggered on any system because they are the result of
programmer error (e.g. typo) should be fine.

- Reece