GitHub Action to run Tests on Mac

[vorburger]

My work today in #649 made me think that a useful start for the whole discussion in #497 could be a GitHub Action to run Tests on Mac.

Perhaps this could be combined with #695.

@abrousseau001 or @stevenodb in case this interests you?

[vorburger]

Mac support was kind of broken for a long time anyway, it never worked on ARM M1, and originally only worked on old x86 Macs, but in (upcoming, on main as of today, but not yet released) 3.1.0 with the merge of #771 which @TheKnowles has contributed (which just got merged as part of #772) even that is now broken.

Working on this issue for CI coverage on Mac will probably only make sense after #296...

[abrousseau001]

I think once the strategy going forward for mac support is set @vorburger. I can look at making the contribution. My biggest issue was that no matter the path for mac, it never felt first party (even back in the days I contributed built mac binaries). If MariaDB started to provide them, or even having a trusted third-party like many open-source projects, then we would be better off.

Containers are an option, but I feel like we are creating a larger problem with the original goal of having minimal dependencies to run MariaDB. Development changes and so do goals, but the constrained environment for my previous use case wouldn't have access to containers.

• Adam

[vorburger]

Let's use #497 re. binaries, and use this issue about adding test coverage on Mac via a GitHub Action to run Tests on Mac. Using https://github.com/ankane/setup-mariadb and https://github.com/MariaDB4j/MariaDB4j#how-using-existing-native-mariadb-binaries, perhaps with some #699 (comment) from @cverges-medallia sprinkled over it could be a way forward for that, and while I personally won't work on this, I certainly would review any PRs which does that (perhaps best building towards that with smaller PRs).

MariaDB started to provide them, or even having a trusted third-party like many open-source projects

Yeah, if only https://mariadb.org/download had them... but perhaps they do not, because Homebrew has - I don't know.

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