this post was submitted on 01 Sep 2024
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[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

My test suite takes quite a bit of time, not because the code base is huge, but because it consists of a variety of mathematical models that should work under a range of conditions.

This makes it very quick to write a test that's basically "check that every pair of models gives the same output for the same conditions" or "check that re-ordering the inputs in a certain way does not change the output".

If you have 10 models, with three inputs that can be ordered 6 ways, you now suddenly have 60 tests that take maybe 2-3 sec each.

Scaling up: It becomes very easy to write automated testing for a lot of stuff, so even if each individual test is relatively quick, they suddenly take 10-15 min to run total.

The test suite now is โ‰ˆ2000 unit/integration tests, and I have experienced uncovering an obscure bug because a single one of them failed.