It is desirable to have a method to compare what is listed in a (set of) manifest(s) with the files present on disk. There are two possibilities for differences: 1. files exist on disk that are not listed in the manifest (bug 857012) 2. files are referenced in the manifest that do not exist on disk (bug 857966) Currently, the only notion manifestparser.py has internally of any of these things is the `exists` argument to `TestManifest.active_tests`. xpcchecky.py (see bug 683660 and http://mxr.mozilla.org/mozilla-central/source/build/xpccheck.py ) does check for files not included in the manifest and should be ported to manifestparser.py as per bug 683660 . ManifestParser should include a new method in its API: def diff(self, paths=None): """ compare the contents of the ManifestParser to a set of paths. Returns a 2-tuple of ([paths,on,disk,not,in,manifest], [paths,in,manifest,not,on,disk]) - paths : iterable of paths; if not given taken from a superset of paths from manifest items """ There should be a command line frontend `manifestparser.py compare` or `manifestparser.py diff`, e.g.: manifestparser diff [options] manifest1 <manifest2> <...> [--path=path1] [--patpath2] [...] I've chosen this form as, in general, you'll want to compare (a set of manifests) with (a set of paths [probably mostly directories]). At least one manifest.ini is needed. Currently, TestManifest silently ignores test files that do not exist by default (`exists=False` for `TestManifest.active_tests`) (bug 857966) and there is no internal checking for tests in the directory that are not in the manifest. I recommend changing the default of this flag such that missing tests are an error by default, though it is important to retain the ability to run with missing tests. In addition, the above API can/should be used, as applicable, by the runner to do as desired for the case where the manifest != what is on disc. It may be a good idea to mark tests missing on disk as missing....somehow. This all should have tests, of course

Please be careful with dependencies when cloning :-)

Not a clone at all, just a typo. Sorry about that!

There are a number of places in the tree (especially in the build system) where we'd like to perform a "directory diff" against a manifest and optionally reconcile the differences. I started coding some Python to facilitate this: https://hg.mozilla.org/users/gszorc_mozilla.com/mq-sc/file/f410d76a18db/mozbuild-directory-enforcer Feel free to steal my code, finish it up, and check it into mozbase!

(In reply to Gregory Szorc [:gps] from comment #3) > There are a number of places in the tree (especially in the build system) > where we'd like to perform a "directory diff" against a manifest and > optionally reconcile the differences. I started coding some Python to > facilitate this: > > https://hg.mozilla.org/users/gszorc_mozilla.com/mq-sc/file/f410d76a18db/ > mozbuild-directory-enforcer > > Feel free to steal my code, finish it up, and check it into mozbase! That overlaps with mozpack.copier.FileCopier.

(In reply to Jeff Hammel [:jhammel] from comment #2) > Not a clone at all, just a typo. Sorry about that! Ah true (think I was remembering the one from the other day). No problem :-)

(In reply to Mike Hommey [:glandium] from comment #4) > That overlaps with mozpack.copier.FileCopier. Somewhat, yes. I'm trying to think of why I started that version instead of adapting FileCopier. Nothing is coming to me. Perhaps I was drinking.

this was done in the porting of xpccheck -> mozbase