Idea to gain the time of wider testing.

[Robert Dewar]

Ben Elliston wrote:
> On Fri, 2008-02-22 at 20:56 +0100, J.C. Pizarro wrote:
> 
>> I've ideas when there are repetitive processes as e.g. the testing processes.
>>
>> Q1. Why to lose time testing the same reiterated files that always had worked
>>     for many months or years?
> 
> To use an old expression, "past performance is no guarantee of future
> performance".  Just because a test has passed hundreds of times before
> does not mean that a small change will not introduce a regression.  In
> my experience, sometimes regressions  occur where I least expect them.

I very much agree with this, and as machines get faster, more tests can
be run more easily anyway. At first with our internal GNAT suite, we
did separate off tests that had passed for a long time into a separate
suite, run only daily instead of every checkin, but we have found that
with very fast multi-processors available, the test suite takes less
time than it used to, even though it is growing rapidly, and even though
we have put back almost all of those segregated tests.
> 
> Ben
>