diff --git a/examples/test/runner.py b/examples/test/runner.py
old mode 100644
new mode 100755
index dfa2702..4939e08
--- a/examples/test/runner.py
+++ b/examples/test/runner.py
@@ -1,10 +1,29 @@
-import glob
-import unittest
+#!/usr/bin/env python
 
-test_file_strings = glob.glob('test_*.py')
-module_strings = [str[0:len(str)-3] for str in test_file_strings]
-print module_strings
-suites = [unittest.defaultTestLoader.loadTestsFromName(str) for str
-          in module_strings]
-testSuite = unittest.TestSuite(suites)
-text_runner = unittest.TextTestRunner().run(testSuite)
\ No newline at end of file
+"""
+Run all mininet.examples tests
+ -v : verbose output
+ -quick : skip tests that take more than ~30 seconds
+"""
+
+import unittest
+import os
+import sys
+from mininet.util import ensureRoot
+from mininet.clean import cleanup
+
+def runTests( testDir, verbosity=1 ):
+    "discover and run all tests in testDir"
+    # ensure root and cleanup before starting tests
+    ensureRoot()
+    cleanup()
+    # discover all tests in testDir
+    testSuite = unittest.defaultTestLoader.discover( testDir )
+    # run tests
+    unittest.TextTestRunner( verbosity=verbosity ).run( testSuite )
+
+if __name__ == '__main__':
+    # get the directory containing example tests
+    testDir = os.path.dirname( os.path.realpath( __file__ ) )
+    verbosity = 2 if '-v' in sys.argv else 1
+    runTests( testDir, verbosity )