Currently Sparse's test suite has some limited tests for verifying the IR code generation. Most tests are small unit tests that do not actually verify the IR; tests are not even executable. Verifying IR directly is difficult to maintain as Sparse IR is not yet mature and is likely to change in near future going by proposed patches.

I have been creating test cases that use the Sparse-LLVM backend. These tests have following advantages:

a) they are a mix of simple and complex programs
b) all programs are runnable and therefore the tests can be actually verified against expected result or output
c) the tests are designed for Sparse - hence they avoid language features that are not supported by Sparse-LLVM backend

Having these tests in Sparse will allow better regression testing of Sparse prior to a release, thereby increasing confidence and enabling more rapid changes.

The main thing to note about the tests is that some are derived from OpenSource projects and the LICENSE is not always MIT. Hence I suggest marking the tests as having their own LICENSE.

As this is a largish contribution, it is probably easier to just import the changes from the existing repository where these tests are maintained: 

https://github.com/dibyendumajumdar/sparse-testing

I would like to get feedback on this proposal.