Improved TAP tests by replacing sub-optimal uses of ok() with better Test::More functions

Sadhuprasad Patro <b.sadhu@gmail.com>

From: Sadhuprasad Patro <b.sadhu@gmail.com>
To: PostgreSQL Hackers <pgsql-hackers@lists.postgresql.org>
Date: 2025-10-10T05:52:55Z
Lists: pgsql-hackers

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  1. Improve TAP tests by replacing ok() with better Test::More functions

  2. Fix matching check in recovery test 042_low_level_backup

  3. pg_createsubscriber: Fix matching check in TAP test

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Hi all,

I've noticed that many TAP tests in the codebase make sub-optimal use of
the "ok()" function. Specifically, ok() is often used for expressions
involving comparison operators or regex matches, which is not ideal because
other Test::More functions provide much clearer diagnostic messages when
tests fail.

For example, instead of writing:

                   ok($var =~ /foo/, "found foo")

it’s better to write:

                   like($var, /foo/, "found foo")
I experimented by modifying a TAP test in src/bin/pg_dump to deliberately
fail using ok(). The failure output was quite minimal and didn’t give much
detail:

# +++ tap check in src/bin/pg_dump +++
t/005_pg_dump_filterfile.pl .. 1/?
#   Failed test 'table one dumped'
#   at t/005_pg_dump_filterfile.pl line 103.
t/005_pg_dump_filterfile.pl .. 57/? # Looks like you failed 1 test of 108.
t/005_pg_dump_filterfile.pl .. Dubious, test returned 1 (wstat 256, 0x100)
Failed 1/108 subtests

Test Summary Report
-------------------
t/005_pg_dump_filterfile.pl (Wstat: 256 (exited 1) Tests: 108 Failed: 1)
  Failed test:  2
  Non-zero exit status: 1


Then I changed the same test to use like() instead of ok(), which produced
much more informative diagnostics:

# +++ tap check in src/bin/pg_dump +++
t/005_pg_dump_filterfile.pl .. 1/?
#   Failed test 'table one dumped'
#   at t/005_pg_dump_filterfile.pl line 103.
#                   '--
# '
*#     doesn't match '(?^m:^CREATE TABLE public1\.table_one)'*
t/005_pg_dump_filterfile.pl .. 41/? # Looks like you failed 1 test of 108.
t/005_pg_dump_filterfile.pl .. Dubious, test returned 1 (wstat 256, 0x100)
Failed 1/108 subtests

Test Summary Report
-------------------
t/005_pg_dump_filterfile.pl (Wstat: 256 (exited 1) Tests: 108 Failed: 1)
  Failed test:  2
  Non-zero exit status: 1

Based on this, I’ve replaced all such uses of ok() with the more
appropriate is(), isnt(), like(), unlike(), and cmp_ok() functions,
depending on the test case.

Please find the attached patch implementing these improvements...

Thanks for considering the change.
Regards,
SadhuPrasad.
EnterpriseDB.