New Issue: Nightly testing should build the runtime with asserts enabled

jabraham17 · January 9, 2026, 11:39pm

28290, "jabraham17", "Nightly testing should build the runtime with asserts enabled", "2026-01-09T23:37:20Z"

Nightly testing should build the runtime with asserts enabled

opened 11:37PM - 09 Jan 26 UTC

area: Runtime area: BTR

Currently, when we build the runtime for nightly correctness testing, we set `OP…TIMIZE=1`. This explicitly sets `-DNDEBUG` for the runtime, which disables asserts. This means that bugs like https://github.com/chapel-lang/chapel/issues/28289 will slip in, because all tests are not run with asserts enabled. I am not proposing we stop setting `OPTIMIZE=1` for nightly testing (otherwise testing will take forever), but we should definitely have asserts enabled for the majority of nightly testing. Currently, we have `ASSERTS=0` for most nightly tests. I think we should expand that. Furthermore, `ASSERTS` is not threaded into the runtime to control asserts (even though https://chapel-lang.org/docs/main/usingchapel/building.html#makefile-options claims that it is)

Currently, when we build the runtime for nightly correctness testing, we set OPTIMIZE=1. This explicitly sets -DNDEBUG for the runtime, which disables asserts. This means that bugs like [Bug]: assert due to zero length string · Issue #28289 · chapel-lang/chapel · GitHub will slip in, because all tests are not run with asserts enabled.

I am not proposing we stop setting OPTIMIZE=1 for nightly testing (otherwise testing will take forever), but we should definitely have asserts enabled for the majority of nightly testing.

Currently, we have ASSERTS=0 for most nightly tests. I think we should expand that. Furthermore, ASSERTS is not threaded into the runtime to control asserts (even though Building Chapel — Chapel Documentation 2.8 claims that it is)