I am struggling with a mysterious problem I only see on my RHEL4 release build. Some of my unit tests (using boost 1.36 unit test framework) fail on RHEL4 (gcc 3.4.6) and using release build-type. I do not see the problem using RHEL5 release or debug build types (gcc 4.1.2, boost-1.39); neither do I see it on Windows 32 bit or 64 bit using either Visual Studio 2005 (using boost-1.36) or 2008 (using boost-1.39).
Suspecting that this may be due to some subtle memory issue, I proceeded to run valgrind on the test application (minimal case that preserved the problem). Here is what I got when I ran valgrind using "full, no-reachable" mode:
==12285== Memcheck, a memory error detector.
==12285== Copyright (C) 2002-2005, and GNU GPL'd, by Julian Seward et al.
==12285== Using LibVEX rev 1575, a library for dynamic binary translation.
==12285== Copyright (C) 2004-2005, and GNU GPL'd, by OpenWorks LLP.
==12285== Using valgrind-3.1.1, a dynamic binary instrumentation framework.
==12285== Copyright (C) 2000-2005, and GNU GPL'd, by Julian Seward et al.
==12285== For more details, rerun with: -v
==12285==
==12285== My PID = 12285, parent PID = 12284. Prog and args are:
==12285== ./myprojd
==12285==
==12285== Syscall param sigaltstack(ss) points to uninitialised byte(s)
==12285== at 0x3AD682EDA9: sigaltstack (in /lib64/tls/libc-2.3.4.so)
==12285== by 0x6488638: boost::detail::signal_handler::~signal_handler()
(in /<path_to>/libboost_unit_test_framework-gcc34-mt-1_36.so.1.36.0)
==12285== by 0x648975E: boost::execution_monitor::catch_signals
(boost::unit_test::callback0<int> const&)
(in /<path_to>/libboost_unit_test_framework-gcc34-mt-1_36.so.1.36.0)
==12285== by 0x6489813: boost::execution_monitor::execute
(boost::unit_test::callback0<int> const&)
(in /<path_to>/libboost_unit_test_framework-gcc34-mt-1_36.so.1.36.0)
==12285== by 0x648F2E4: boost::unit_test::framework::run(unsigned long, bool)
(in /<path_to>/libboost_unit_test_framework-gcc34-mt-1_36.so.1.36.0)
==12285== by 0x649BD02: boost::unit_test::unit_test_main(bool (*)(), int, char**)
(in /<path_to>/libboost_unit_test_framework-gcc34-mt-1_36.so.1.36.0)
==12285== by 0x4147F0: main (init.cpp:132)
==12285== Address 0x7FEFFF3B0 is on thread 1's stack
==12285==
==12285== ERROR SUMMARY: 6 errors from 1 contexts (suppressed: 4 from 1)
==12285== malloc/free: in use at exit: 190,112 bytes in 1,869 blocks.
==12285== malloc/free: 23,128 allocs, 21,259 frees, 2,520,845 bytes allocated.
==12285== For counts of detected errors, rerun with: -v
==12285== searching for pointers to 1,869 not-freed blocks.
==12285== checked 2,184,272 bytes.
==12285==
==12285== LEAK SUMMARY:
==12285== definitely lost: 0 bytes in 0 blocks.
==12285== possibly lost: 0 bytes in 0 blocks.
==12285== still reachable: 190,112 bytes in 1,869 blocks.
==12285== suppressed: 0 bytes in 0 blocks.
==12285== Reachable blocks (those to which a pointer was found) are not shown.
==12285== To see them, rerun with: --show-reachable=yes
Ofcourse, I ran this in debug mode (although as I mentioned the error occurs only in release mode). If I run valgrind in release mode, I get the same output (with perhaps less detail such as line #s). From this it appears that the problem is somehow in boost-1.36, or perhaps my definition of init_unit_test_suite? Clearly one thing I can try is to run using boost-1.39 on all platforms; but unfortunately, we're currently on boost-1.36 for RHEL4 and VS2005, and so this may not be practical yet.
I also observe that forcing a certain logger output to console at a point where the test fails, enables the test to pass (not good, I know)! Suspecting that this might be due that I commented all logger output and ran valgrind - so that's what's posted above. If you need some code snippets of the init_unit_test_suite function; I can post that, if it helps. Any ideas to resolve this are welcome and greatly appreciated.
05/26/2011 Edit:
Here's the init_unit_test_suite - appreciate if somebody could take a look.
std::ofstream log_stream;
std::ofstream report_stream;
const_string retrieve_framework_parameter( const_string cla_name, int argc, char** argv ) {
//- first try to find parameter among command line arguments if present
if( argc ) {
//- locate corresponding cla name
if( !cla_name.is_empty() ) {
for( int i = 1; i < argc; ++i ) {
if( cla_name == const_string( argv[i], cla_name.size() ) && argv[i][cla_name.size()] == '=' ) {
const_string result = argv[i] + cla_name.size() + 1;
for( int j = i; j < argc; ++j ) {
argv[j] = argv[j+1];
}
--argc;
return result;
}
}
}
}
return std::getenv( cla_name.begin() );
}
//! Format results to CPP UNIT xml
class simple_report_formatter : public results_reporter::format {
public:
virtual void results_report_start( std::ostream&) {
}
virtual void results_report_finish( std::ostream&) {
}
virtual void test_unit_report_start(test_unit const&, std::ostream&) {
}
virtual void test_unit_report_finish(test_unit const& tu, std::ostream& out) {
if( tu.p_type == tut_case ) {
const test_results& r = results_collector.results(tu.p_id);
if( r.passed() ) {
out<<"[PASS] ";
} else {
out<<"[FAIL] ";
}
out<<"Test Case <unit_"<<tu.p_name.get()<<"> ";
if( !r.passed() ) {
out<<" - ";
out<<"!! Assertions failed: "<<r.p_assertions_failed;
out<<" - See log files for details on failures !!";
}
out<<std::endl;
#if defined(MYPROJ_WINDOWS) && defined(MYPROJ_DEBUG)
if( !r.passed() ) {
std::ostringstream msg;
msg<<"!! "<<tu.p_name.get()<<" FAILED !!"<<std::endl;
OutputDebugStringA(msg.str().c_str());
}
#endif
}
}
virtual void do_confirmation_report(test_unit const&, std::ostream&) {
}
};
bool init_unit_test_suite() {
const_string log_file = retrieve_framework_parameter(
"--log_file",
framework::master_test_suite().argc,
framework::master_test_suite().argv
);
if( !log_file.empty() ) {
log_stream.open(log_file.begin());
unit_test_log.set_stream(log_stream);
}
const_string report_file = retrieve_framework_parameter(
"--report_file",
framework::master_test_suite().argc,
framework::master_test_suite().argv
);
if( !report_file.empty() ) {
report_stream.open(report_file.begin());
results_reporter::set_stream(report_stream);
}
if( runtime_config::report_format() == CLF ) {
results_reporter::set_format(new simple_report_formatter);
}
// This is providing the sensible default configuration when the test is being run
// without any input parameters whatsoever: print the final report to console
if( framework::master_test_suite().argc <= 1 ) {
results_reporter::set_stream(std::cout);
results_reporter::set_format(new simple_report_formatter);
results_reporter::set_level(DETAILED_REPORT);
}
framework::master_test_suite().p_name.set(MYPROJ_TEST_SUITE_NAME);
return true;
}
