dirname() is a slow function compared with __DIR__ and using
'/../'. Moodle has a large number of legacy files that are included
each time a page loads and is not able to use an autoloader as it is
functional code. This allows those required includes to perform as
best as possible in this situation.
Comment format (FORMAT_...) was correctly being processed when the
manual grading happened as the result of a form submission. It was only
when done using the question_usage or question_attempt API method that
there was no way to specify the format. (Although I think the only place
this API as used was in the unit tests.)
Note that question_attempt::manual_grade API had to change, but I don't
think that is a real API change. Calling code should be using
question_usage::question_attempt, which is backwards compatible.
Note that now, if you don't pass format, then no error is generated, but
a developer debugging message is generated.
1/ type/match/tests/walkthrough_test.php - tests are failing randomly, looks like some weird randomisation is going on there - see TODOs
2/ type/multianswer/tests/upgradelibnewqe_test.php contains invalid expected value - see TODO