Building and testing

Reusable example encoding test

tests/encode_file.cmake assembles an existing file and checks that the source-named .bin bytes match the first hexadecimal line of stdout. Pass EXPECTED_HEX to also check the expected instruction encoding. Run from the repository root after building:

cmake "-DKASM=build/windows-debug/Debug/kasm.exe" "-DSOURCE=examples/program.asm" "-DEXPECTED_HEX=B8 2A 00 00 00 C3" -P tests/encode_file.cmake

Change SOURCE to reuse the script with another example; omit EXPECTED_HEX when you only want to check successful assembly and binary/stdout consistency. By default, each source path gets its own directory under build/example-tests. The script prints the resulting binary path. Repeating the same example replaces its previous binary. You can override the directory with -DOUTPUT_DIR=<path>; use different directories for examples that run concurrently.

CTest uses this script for examples/mov_42.asm, examples/ret.asm, and examples/program.asm, saving separate binaries under build/windows-debug/examples/Debug/<test-name>/<input-name>.bin with the Windows Debug preset. To register another example, add a call inside BUILD_TESTING:

add_example_test(my_example examples/my_example.asm "B8 07 00 00 00 C3")

Configure and run the suite

Build from a source checkout with CMake and a C compiler. The Windows presets target Visual Studio 2026 with the C++ build tools installed. The Linux/WSL2 preset uses GCC and Make. Use a CMake version that supports your generator and the repository’s version-8 preset file; the basic CMake project requires 3.20 or newer when configuring without presets.

The registered CTest tests cover:

• Exact MOV encoding: mov eax,42; produces B8 2A 00 00 00.
• ADD expression evaluation, exact emitted bytes, and the decoded listing from examples/add.asm.
• Exact decoding of examples/decode.asm, including instruction offsets, the backward JNZ target, and the success message.
• Exact RET and combined MOV/RET encoding, with saved binary bytes checked against stdout and expected bytes in separate example directories.
• Semantic evaluation of mov eax, (10+4)*3; to 42.
• Exact expression ASTs for integers, addition/subtraction, multiplication precedence, and parentheses overriding precedence.
• Multiple MOV statements with LF and CRLF line endings, binary literals in instructions, evaluated values (including inside nested blocks), and a missing-semicolon diagnostic.
• Dynamic storage growth to 300 MOV statements, preserving their operands.
• Empty, nested, and sibling blocks; blank lines within blocks; statement order and expression references; missing/extra brace diagnostics; and acceptance at MAX_BLOCK_DEPTH with rejection one level beyond it.
• Integer literal lexing, comments, newline tokens, LF/CRLF/CR line endings, unterminated-comment diagnostics, and long sequences of adjacent comments.
• The 16-bit, data-directive, control-instruction, and overflow-safety suites described in their own reference chapters.

Expression tests use expr_test_driver to inspect ASTs independently of the encoding CLI. Semantic and multiple-statement tests use semantic_test_driver to inspect statement counts and evaluated values. Lexer tests use lexer_test_driver. These drivers are built only when testing is enabled. The label and jump samples, C inspection, and Linux/Windows execution examples in Generated C data, execution, and decoding are manual checks; they are not currently registered as CTest tests.

Run these commands from the repository root (the directory containing CMakePresets.json). Configure and build before running CTest:

cmake --preset windows-debug -DBUILD_TESTING=ON
cmake --build --preset windows-debug
ctest --test-dir build/windows-debug -C Debug --output-on-failure -V

cmake --preset GCC-debug -DBUILD_TESTING=ON
cmake --build --preset GCC-debug
ctest --test-dir build/GCC-debug -C Debug --output-on-failure -V

The presets create separate build directories under build; CTest must point to the configured directory. For Release, use windows-release in all three commands and replace -C Debug with -C Release.

If your terminal is already in build/GCC-debug, run cd ../.. first to return to the repository root before using the commands above.

The commands include -V for verbose output even when tests pass; omit it for a shorter report.

After adding a new source file, rerun the configure command before building so the generated project includes it.