[Python-Dev] the regression test suite

[Guido van Rossum]

> My kitchen programs show that regrtest.py keeps requesting more and
> more memory until it finishes all tests. IOW, it doesn't finalize
> properly each test. It keeps importing modules, without deleting them
> after each test. I think that before a particular test is run, we need to
> save the value of sys.modules, then restore it after the test (before
> running the next one). In a module enabled interpreter, this reduces
> the memory consumption almost by half...
> 
> Patch?
> 
> Think about the number of new tests that will be added in the future.
> I don't want to tolerate a silently approaching useless disk swapping :-)

I'm not particularly concerned, but it does make some sense.  (And is
faster than starting a fresh interpreter for each test.)  So why don't
you give it a try!

--Guido van Rossum (home page: http://www.python.org/~guido/)