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https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/BEAM-7825?page=com.atlassian.jira.plugin.system.issuetabpanels:all-tabpanel
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Alexey Strokach updated BEAM-7825:
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    Description: 
The documentation for Beam's Windowing and Triggers functionality [states 
that|https://beam.apache.org/documentation/programming-guide/#triggers] _"if 
you use Beam’s default windowing configuration and default trigger, Beam 
outputs the aggregated result when it estimates all data has arrived, and 
discards all subsequent data for that window"_. However, it seems that the 
current behavior of Python's DirectRunner is inconsistent with both of those 
points. As the {{StreamingWordGroupIT.test_discard_late_data}} test shows, 
DirectRunner appears to process every data point that it reads from the input 
stream, irrespective of whether or not the timestamp of that data point is 
older than the timestamps of the windows that have already been processed. 
Furthermore, as the {{StreamingWordGroupIT.test_single_output_per_window}} test 
shows, DirectRunner generates multiple "panes" for the same window, apparently 
disregarding the notion of a watermark? The Dataflow runner passes both of 
those end-to-end tests.

Until the limitations of DirectRunner are addressed, maybe they should be 
listed on the [DirectRunner documentation 
page](https://beam.apache.org/documentation/runners/direct/)?

  was:
The documentation for Beam's Windowing and Triggers functionality [states 
that|https://beam.apache.org/documentation/programming-guide/#triggers] _"if 
you use Beam’s default windowing configuration and default trigger, Beam 
outputs the aggregated result when it estimates all data has arrived, and 
discards all subsequent data for that window"_. However, it seems that the 
current behavior of Python's DirectRunner is inconsistent with both of those 
points. In my experience, DirectRunner will process every data point that it 
reads from the input stream, irrespective of whether or not the timestamp of 
that data point is older than the timestamps of the windows that have already 
been processed. Furthermore, it regularly generates multiple "panes" for the 
same window, apparently disregarding the notion of a watermark?

An integration test demonstrating the inconsistencies between DirectRunner and 
Dataflow is provided in the linked PR.

Until the limitations of DirectRunner are addressed, maybe they should be 
listed on the [DirectRunner documentation 
page](https://beam.apache.org/documentation/runners/direct/)?

As far as I understand (I have not seen this explicitly documented anywhere), 
in the case of Cloud Dataflow, the pipeline will first process all elements 
that have accumulated in a PubSub subscription before the start of the 
pipeline, and will then process all new elements which have a timestamp within 
a certain narrow range of the current time (UTC). Would this be the behavior 
that DirectRunner should be trying to emulate? While Dataflow does emit a 
single pane per window (by default) and discards late data, it may be too eager 
in what data it calls "late"?



> Python's DirectRunner emits multiple panes per window and does not discard 
> late data
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>                 Key: BEAM-7825
>                 URL: https://issues.apache.org/jira/browse/BEAM-7825
>             Project: Beam
>          Issue Type: Bug
>          Components: sdk-py-core
>    Affects Versions: 2.13.0
>         Environment: OS: Debian rodete.
> Beam versions: 2.15.0.dev.
> Python versions: Python 2.7, Python 3.7
>            Reporter: Alexey Strokach
>            Priority: Major
>          Time Spent: 3.5h
>  Remaining Estimate: 0h
>
> The documentation for Beam's Windowing and Triggers functionality [states 
> that|https://beam.apache.org/documentation/programming-guide/#triggers] _"if 
> you use Beam’s default windowing configuration and default trigger, Beam 
> outputs the aggregated result when it estimates all data has arrived, and 
> discards all subsequent data for that window"_. However, it seems that the 
> current behavior of Python's DirectRunner is inconsistent with both of those 
> points. As the {{StreamingWordGroupIT.test_discard_late_data}} test shows, 
> DirectRunner appears to process every data point that it reads from the input 
> stream, irrespective of whether or not the timestamp of that data point is 
> older than the timestamps of the windows that have already been processed. 
> Furthermore, as the {{StreamingWordGroupIT.test_single_output_per_window}} 
> test shows, DirectRunner generates multiple "panes" for the same window, 
> apparently disregarding the notion of a watermark? The Dataflow runner passes 
> both of those end-to-end tests.
> Until the limitations of DirectRunner are addressed, maybe they should be 
> listed on the [DirectRunner documentation 
> page](https://beam.apache.org/documentation/runners/direct/)?



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