test for absence of infinite loop

[Cameron Simpson]

On 17Jul2018 10:10, Robin Becker <robin at reportlab.com> wrote:
>A user reported an infinite loop in reportlab. I determined a possible 
>cause and fix and would like to test for absence of the loop. Is there 
>any way to check for presence/absence of an infinite loop in python? I 
>imagine we could do something like call an external process and see if it 
>takes too long, but that seems a bit flaky.

While others have kindly pointed you at the halting problem (unsolvable in the 
general case) you can usually verify that the specific problem you fixed is 
fixed. Can you figure out how long the task should run with your fix in a test 
case? Not as time, but in loop iterations? Put a counter in the loop and check 
that its value doesn't exceed that.

Cheers,
Cameron Simpson <cs at cskk.id.au>