[Python-Dev] "Buildbot" category on the tracker

[R. David Murray]

On Thu, 29 Oct 2009 at 19:41, Jesse Noller wrote:
> Then again, I know for a fact certain tests fail ONLY on certain
> buildbots because of the way they're configured. For example, certain
> multiprocessing tests will fail if /dev/shm isn't accessible on Linux,
> and several of the buildbosts are in tight chroot jails and don't have
> that exposed.
>
> Is it a bug in that buildbot, a platform specific bug, etc?

I'd say that particular one is a bug in the tests.  If /dev/shm is
not available and is required, then the tests should be skipped with
an appropriate message.  It would also secondarily be an issue with
the buildbot fleet, since multiprocessing would then not be getting
thoroughly tested by those buildbots.

IMO a buildbot category might be useful for bugs that show up in a
buildbot but no one can (currently) reproduce, or problems with the
buildbots themselves.  I don't think we currently have any bugs filed that
fall in the second category, but multiprocessing not getting completely
tested because of lack of /dev/shm would fall into that category.
Issue 4970 was in the first category until recently.

But the real reason for having a buildbot category (or at least a keyword)
would be to be able to tag all bugs that are currently making buildbots
fail that are _not_ the result of a recent checkin.  This would make
the task of finding the bugs that need to be cleaned up to stabilize
the buildbot fleet easier.  I'm currently aware of issues 4970, 3892,
and 6462 in this category, and there are a few more that we can/will file
if we continue to pay attention to the failure reports now arriving on
the irc channel.

--David (RDM)