58. Running DPDK Unit Tests with Meson

This section describes how to run test cases with the DPDK meson build system.

Steps to build and install DPDK using meson can be referred in Installing DPDK Using the meson build system

58.1. Grouping of test cases

Test cases have been classified into four different groups.

  • Fast tests.
  • Performance tests.
  • Driver tests.
  • Tests which produce lists of objects as output, and therefore that need manual checking.

These tests can be run using the argument to meson test as --suite project_name:label.

For example:

$ meson test -C <build path> --suite DPDK:fast-tests

If the <build path> is current working directory, the -C <build path> option can be skipped as below:

$ meson test --suite DPDK:fast-tests

The project name is optional so the following is equivalent to the previous command:

$ meson test --suite fast-tests

The meson command to list all available tests:

$ meson test --list

Test cases are run serially by default for better stability.

Arguments of test() that can be provided in meson.build are as below:

  • is_parallel is used to run test case either in parallel or non-parallel mode.
  • timeout is used to specify the timeout of test case.
  • args is used to specify test specific parameters.
  • env is used to specify test specific environment parameters.

58.2. Dealing with skipped test cases

Some unit test cases have a dependency on external libraries, driver modules or config flags, without which the test cases cannot be run. Such test cases will be reported as skipped if they cannot run. To enable those test cases, the user should ensure the required dependencies are met. Below are a few possible causes why tests may be skipped:

  1. Optional external libraries are not found.
  2. Config flags for the dependent library are not enabled.
  3. Dependent driver modules are not installed on the system.
  4. Not enough processing cores. Some tests are skipped on machines with 2 or 4 cores.