Regression test instructions and analysis.
The PostgreSQL regression tests are a comprehensive set of tests for the SQL implementation embedded in PostgreSQL developed by Jolly Chen and Andrew Yu. It tests standard SQL operations as well as the extended capabilities of PostgreSQL.
These tests have recently been revised by Marc Fournier and Thomas Lockhart and are now packaged as functional units which should make them easier to run and easier to interpret. From PostgreSQL v6.1 onward the regression tests are current for every official release.
Some properly installed and fully functional PostgreSQL installations can fail some of these regression tests due to artifacts of floating point representation and time zone support. The current tests are evaluated using a simple "diff" algorithm, and are sensitive to small system differences. For apparently failed tests, examining the differences may reveal that the differences are not significant.
The regression testing notes below assume the following (except where noted):
Commands are Unix-compatible. See note below.
Defaults are used except where noted.
User postgres is the Postgres superuser.
The source path is /usr/src/pgsql (other paths are possible).
The runtime path is /usr/local/pgsql (other paths are possible).
The regression test is invoked by the make command which compiles a C program into a shared library in the current directory. Localized shell scripts are also created in the current directory. The output file templates are massaged into the ./expected/*.out files. The localization replaces macros in the source files with absolute pathnames and user names.
Normally, the regression test should be run as the pg_superuser since the 'src/test/regress' directory and sub-directories are owned by the pg_superuser. If you run the regression test as another user the 'src/test/regress' directory tree should be writeable to that user.
It was formerly necessary to run the postmaster with system time zone set to PST, but this is no longer required. You can run the regression tests under your normal postmaster configuration. The test script will set the PGTZ environment variable to ensure that timezone-dependent tests produce the expected results. However, your system must provide library support for the PST8PDT time zone, or the timezone-dependent tests will fail. To verify that your machine does have this support, type the following:
setenv TZ PST8PDT
date
The "date" command above should have returned the current system time in the PST8PDT time zone. If the PST8PDT database is not available, then your system may have returned the time in GMT. If the PST8PDT time zone is not available, you can set the time zone rules explicitly:
setenv PGTZ PST8PDT7,M04.01.0,M10.05.03