CLI --debug flag

[sindresorhus]

For running everything serially so it's easier to debug concurrency issues.

In the future it might do other things too to aid in debugging. Suggestions welcome.

[Qix-]

👍

[vadimdemedes]

Currently, ava does not have a single config store, so we have to come up with some way to share configuration between scripts. Right now, I can see 2 ways to implement this, without major code changes:

1. ava --debug sets environment variable, so that other scripts (files) see it: process.env.AVA_DEBUG = true. Also, it will be possible to enable debug mode by AVA_DEBUG=true ava.
2. Have a config.js with module.exports = {} and set config values there (all scripts that require('./config') will get the same object).

What do you think?

[vadimdemedes]

Config would also be handy for #27

[Qix-]

Do you mean for child processes? Or just for the AVA scripts in general?

[vadimdemedes]

@Qix- Sorry, did not understand your question

[Qix-]

I re-read your comment; I think see what you mean now.

I'd have to test, but I'd suspect that ad-hoc environment variables added to process.env would be passed down to child processes too, which means that's a plausible way of storing configuration so child AVA processes will be aware of configuration. Unless that's not how @sindresorhus plans on implementing child processes.

[vadimdemedes]

Yes, child processes will get modified process.env object (node.js docs say so).

[sindresorhus]

I don't understand how this is related to a --debug flag? Right now it doesn't use any child-processes, but just require's the test files.

As for sharing config with sub-processes, that's better discussed in #1. But tl;dr, child_process.fork and message passing.

[vadimdemedes]

@sindresorhus I was talking about the ways to indicate, that user specified --debug flag and wants tests to run serially. For example, as for now, how would lib/test.js know, that cli.js has debug = true?

[sindresorhus]

It could just read argv: process.argv.indexOf('--debug') !== -1. But more likely the CLI will pass it as an option to the lib/test.js interface.