Chapter 30. Regression Tests

The regression tests are a comprehensive set of tests for the SQL implementation in PostgreSQL™. They test standard SQL operations as well as the extended capabilities of PostgreSQL™.

The regression tests can be run against an already installed and running server, or using a temporary installation within the build tree. Furthermore, there is a parallel and a sequential mode for running the tests. The sequential method runs each test script alone, while the parallel method starts up multiple server processes to run groups of tests in parallel. Parallel testing adds confidence that interprocess communication and locking are working correctly.

To run the parallel regression tests after building but before installation, type:

make check

in the top-level directory. (Or you can change to src/test/regress and run the command there.) At the end you should see something like:

=======================
 All 115 tests passed.
=======================

or otherwise a note about which tests failed. See the section called “Test Evaluation” below before assuming that a failure represents a serious problem.

Because this test method runs a temporary server, it will not work if you did the build as the root user, since the server will not start as root. Recommended procedure is not to do the build as root, or else to perform testing after completing the installation.

If you have configured PostgreSQL™ to install into a location where an older PostgreSQL™ installation already exists, and you perform make check before installing the new version, you might find that the tests fail because the new programs try to use the already-installed shared libraries. (Typical symptoms are complaints about undefined symbols.) If you wish to run the tests before overwriting the old installation, you'll need to build with configure --disable-rpath. It is not recommended that you use this option for the final installation, however.

The parallel regression test starts quite a few processes under your user ID. Presently, the maximum concurrency is twenty parallel test scripts, which means forty processes: there's a server process and a psql process for each test script. So if your system enforces a per-user limit on the number of processes, make sure this limit is at least fifty or so, else you might get random-seeming failures in the parallel test. If you are not in a position to raise the limit, you can cut down the degree of parallelism by setting the MAX_CONNECTIONS parameter. For example:

make MAX_CONNECTIONS=10 check

runs no more than ten tests concurrently.

To run the tests after installation (see Chapter 15, Installation from Source Code), initialize a data area and start the server as explained in Chapter 17, Server Setup and Operation, then type:

make installcheck

or for a parallel test:

make installcheck-parallel

The tests will expect to contact the server at the local host and the default port number, unless directed otherwise by PGHOST and PGPORT environment variables. The tests will be run in a database named regression; any existing database by this name will be dropped. The tests will also transiently create some cluster-wide objects, such as user identities named regressuserN.

The make check and make installcheck commands run only the core regression tests, which test built-in functionality of the PostgreSQL™ server. The source distribution also contains additional test suites, most of them having to do with add-on functionality such as optional procedural languages.

To run all test suites applicable to the modules that have been selected to be built, including the core tests, type one of these commands at the top of the build tree:

make check-world
make installcheck-world

These commands run the tests using temporary servers or an already-installed server, respectively, just as previously explained for make check and make installcheck. Other considerations are the same as previously explained for each method. Note that make check-world builds a separate temporary installation tree for each tested module, so it requires a great deal more time and disk space than make installcheck-world.

Alternatively, you can run individual test suites by typing make check or make installcheck in the appropriate subdirectory of the build tree. Keep in mind that make installcheck assumes you've installed the relevant module(s), not only the core server.

The additional tests that can be invoked this way include:

When using installcheck mode, these tests will destroy any existing databases named pl_regression, contrib_regression, isolationtest, regress1, or connectdb, as well as regression.