Re: [COMMITTERS] pgsql: make_restrictinfo() failed to attach the specified

On Wed, Nov 16, 2005 at 11:05:11PM -0300, Alvaro Herrera wrote:
> Christopher Kings-Lynne wrote:
> > >I've never been a fan of "regression tests" in the narrow sense of
> > >"let's test for this specific mistake we made once".  If you can devise
> > >a test that catches a class of errors including the one you actually
> > >made, that's a different story, because it's much more likely to catch a
> > >real future problem.
> > 
> > Heh.  See what I do is envision a future 10 years from now when the guy 
> > who truly understands the planner and executor (Tom) has long gone and 
> > the rest of us poor buggers keep on trying to change and fix things, 
> > thereby recreating all these 10 year old bugs :)
> 
> That's why someone else should be studying the planner and executor code
> right now ...  I've long wanted to start doing it but I've been always
> distracted with other minutia ...

Sure, but people make mistakes. Incredibly, I think you can even find
evidence of Tom making mistakes if you dig deep enough into commit logs
and list archives! ;)

I certainly agree that a test that will catch multiple errors is better
than one that catches few (or only one), but isn't a test for a specific
case better than none at all? Is the concern how long make check takes?
-- 
Jim C. Nasby, Sr. Engineering Consultant      jnasby@pervasive.com
Pervasive Software      http://pervasive.com    work: 512-231-6117
vcard: http://jim.nasby.net/pervasive.vcf       cell: 512-569-9461