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  1. doc: Document how to run a subset of regress tests

  1. Running a single test

    Viktor Holmberg <v@viktorh.net> — 2025-11-17T10:26:59Z

    Hello hackers

Apologies if this is a n00b question - but really can’t find anything about it in the docs.
I can run all the regression tests with `make test`. But is there a way to run a single specific test?
It’d be nice to do this for example when adding extra assertions to a test, without touching the code.

/Viktor Holmberg

  2. Re: Running a single test

    Heikki Linnakangas <hlinnaka@iki.fi> — 2025-11-17T10:55:06Z

    On 17/11/2025 12:26, Viktor Holmberg wrote:
> Hello hackers
> 
> Apologies if this is a n00b question - but really can’t find anything 
> about it in the docs.
> I can run all the regression tests with `make test`. But is there a way 
> to run a single specific test?
> It’d be nice to do this for example when adding extra assertions to a 
> test, without touching the code.

The main test suite that 'make check' runs is quick enough that usually 
I just run them all. But sometimes if I want to iterate quickly on a 
single test, I modify "parallel_schedule", commenting out all the other 
tests, and then use "make check". You could also call the pg_regress 
program directly and pass the name of the test as an argument, but I 
find it easier to just modify parallel_schedule.

"make check-world" takes a little longer. If you want to run just one of 
the test suites that that executes, you can run "make check" in the 
right subdirectory. For example, "(cd src/bin/pg_config; make check)"

See also the corresponding instructions for meson builds at 
https://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/Meson#Test_related_commands. Meson is 
much better at running the "world" test suites in parallel, and faster 
to compile anyway, so I highly recommend switching to meson.

- Heikki

  3. Re: Running a single test

    Aleksander Alekseev <aleksander@tigerdata.com> — 2025-11-17T11:15:52Z

    Hi Victor,

> Apologies if this is a n00b question - but really can’t find anything about it in the docs.
> I can run all the regression tests with `make test`. But is there a way to run a single specific test?
> It’d be nice to do this for example when adding extra assertions to a test, without touching the code.

I would recommend using Meson. It's much faster and Autotools support
will be removed in the future.

I have a little cheat sheet on the subject [1]. It's in Russian but
Google Translate will help. For instance you can do:

```
meson test -C build --suite postgresql:test_slru 'test_slru/regress'
```

If you believe there is room for improvement in the official
documentation, patches are welcome.

[1]: https://eax.me/2022/2022-12-19-postgresql-meson.html

-- 
Best regards,
Aleksander Alekseev

  4. Re: Running a single test

    jian he <jian.universality@gmail.com> — 2025-11-17T11:57:27Z

    On Mon, Nov 17, 2025 at 6:27 PM Viktor Holmberg <v@viktorh.net> wrote:
>
> Hello hackers
>
> Apologies if this is a n00b question - but really can’t find anything about it in the docs.
> I can run all the regression tests with `make test`. But is there a way to run a single specific test?
> It’d be nice to do this for example when adding extra assertions to a test, without touching the code.
>
hi.

run test_setup.sql, boolean.sql, char.sql tests only
you can use

make check-tests TESTS="test_setup boolean char"

this is not documented, see
https://postgr.es/m/CA+renyXB5jYG9r5-CaDc4g607EB398QwTk_efEXTzarrO8bPzw@mail.gmail.com


meson,
there is patch available:
https://commitfest.postgresql.org/patch/5405/

after apply the patch, you can use
meson test -C $your_build_dir --suite setup --verbose
TESTS='test_setup boolean char' meson test -C $your_build_dir --suite
regress --verbose

  5. Re: Running a single test

    Viktor Holmberg <v@viktorh.net> — 2025-11-18T08:55:31Z

    Thank you both. I was not aware of meson at all, I had some idea that it was something used exclusively by the CI server.
FWIW, that doc patch would have helped me!

/Viktor

  6. Re: Running a single test

    Daniel Gustafsson <daniel@yesql.se> — 2025-11-18T09:11:04Z

    > On 18 Nov 2025, at 09:55, Viktor Holmberg <v@viktorh.net> wrote:

> FWIW, that doc patch would have helped me!

Maybe we should resurrect it then, I tweaked it a fraction to better match the
language in that section.

--
Daniel Gustafsson

  7. Re: Running a single test

    Viktor Holmberg <v@viktorh.net> — 2025-11-18T09:47:49Z

    On 18 Nov 2025 at 10:11 +0100, Daniel Gustafsson <daniel@yesql.se>, wrote:
> > On 18 Nov 2025, at 09:55, Viktor Holmberg <v@viktorh.net> wrote:
> > FWIW, that doc patch would have helped me!
> >
> > Maybe we should resurrect it then, I tweaked it a fraction to better match the
> > language in that section.
> >
> > --
> > Daniel Gustafsson
Looks good!

  8. Re: Running a single test

    Nazir Bilal Yavuz <byavuz81@gmail.com> — 2025-11-18T10:03:07Z

    Hi,

On Tue, 18 Nov 2025 at 12:11, Daniel Gustafsson <daniel@yesql.se> wrote:
>
> > On 18 Nov 2025, at 09:55, Viktor Holmberg <v@viktorh.net> wrote:
>
> > FWIW, that doc patch would have helped me!

Postgres wiki page [1] has nice information too.

>
> Maybe we should resurrect it then, I tweaked it a fraction to better match the
> language in that section.

+1 for this change. Patch LGTM.

[1] https://wiki.postgresql.org/wiki/Meson#Test_related_commands

-- 
Regards,
Nazir Bilal Yavuz
Microsoft

  9. Re: Running a single test

    Andrew Dunstan <andrew@dunslane.net> — 2025-11-18T13:59:20Z

    On 2025-11-17 Mo 6:57 AM, jian he wrote:
> On Mon, Nov 17, 2025 at 6:27 PM Viktor Holmberg <v@viktorh.net> wrote:
>> Hello hackers
>>
>> Apologies if this is a n00b question - but really can’t find anything about it in the docs.
>> I can run all the regression tests with `make test`. But is there a way to run a single specific test?
>> It’d be nice to do this for example when adding extra assertions to a test, without touching the code.
>>
> hi.
>
> run test_setup.sql, boolean.sql, char.sql tests only
> you can use
>
> make check-tests TESTS="test_setup boolean char"
>
> this is not documented, see
> https://postgr.es/m/CA+renyXB5jYG9r5-CaDc4g607EB398QwTk_efEXTzarrO8bPzw@mail.gmail.com
>
>
> meson,
> there is patch available:
> https://commitfest.postgresql.org/patch/5405/
>
> after apply the patch, you can use
> meson test -C $your_build_dir --suite setup --verbose
> TESTS='test_setup boolean char' meson test -C $your_build_dir --suite
> regress --verbose
>
>

I'm off for a couple of days, but intending to commit this later this 
week unless someone beats me to it.


cheers


andrew


--
Andrew Dunstan
EDB: https://www.enterprisedb.com