Noah Misch <n...@leadboat.com> writes: > On Thu, Feb 17, 2022 at 09:48:25PM -0800, Andres Freund wrote: >> Meson's test runner has the concept of a "timeout multiplier" for ways of >> running tests. Meson's stuff is about entire tests (i.e. one tap test), so >> doesn't apply here, but I wonder if we shouldn't do something similar?
> Hmmm. It is good if the user can express an intent that continues to make > sense if we change the default timeout. For the buildfarm use case, a > multiplier is moderately better on that axis (PG_TEST_TIMEOUT_MULTIPLIER=100 > beats PG_TEST_TIMEOUT_DEFAULT=18000). For the hacker use case, an absolute > value is substantially better on that axis (PG_TEST_TIMEOUT_DEFAULT=3 beats > PG_TEST_TIMEOUT_MULTIPLIER=.016666). FWIW, I'm fairly sure that PGISOLATIONTIMEOUT=300 was selected after finding that smaller values didn't work reliably in the buildfarm. Now maybe 741d7f1 fixed that, but I wouldn't count on it. So while I approve of the idea to remove PGISOLATIONTIMEOUT in favor of using this centralized setting, I think that we might need to have a multiplier there, or else we'll end up with PG_TEST_TIMEOUT_DEFAULT set to 300 across the board. Perhaps the latter is fine, but a multiplier seems a bit more flexible. On the other hand, I also support your point that an absolute setting is easier to think about / adjust for special uses. So maybe we should just KISS and use a single absolute setting until we find a hard reason why that doesn't work well. regards, tom lane