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MINOR: [Docs][C++] Clarify ARROW_TEST_DATA requirement for tests #48789

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MINOR: [Docs][C++] Clarify ARROW_TEST_DATA requirement for tests #48789

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MINOR: [docs][C++] Clarify ARROW_TEST_DATA requirement for tests
meher745 Jan 8, 2026
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docs: move test data note for better visibility
meher745 Jan 8, 2026
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docs: remove trailing whitespace in building.rst
meher745 Jan 9, 2026
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19 changes: 19 additions & 0 deletions docs/source/developers/cpp/building.rst
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Expand Up @@ -314,6 +314,25 @@ The unit tests are not built by default. After building, one can also invoke
the unit tests using the ``ctest`` tool provided by CMake (note that ``test``
depends on ``python`` being available).

.. note::
If you are building with tests (``-DARROW_BUILD_TESTS=ON``), you must ensure
the test data submodules are initialized and the environment variables
``ARROW_TEST_DATA`` and ``PARQUET_TEST_DATA`` are set. Without these, several
tests (especially IPC and Parquet tests) will fail with an ``IOError``.

To initialize submodules, run:

.. code-block:: shell

$ git submodule update --init --recursive

Then set the variables to the absolute paths of your testing data folders:

.. code-block:: shell

$ export ARROW_TEST_DATA="<absolute_path_to_arrow>/testing/data"
$ export PARQUET_TEST_DATA="<absolute_path_to_arrow>/cpp/submodules/parquet-testing/data"

On some Linux distributions, running the test suite might require setting an
explicit locale. If you see any locale-related errors, try setting the
environment variable (which requires the ``locales`` package or equivalent):
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