palladiumcore/test/README.md

This directory contains integration tests that test palladiumd and its utilities in their entirety. It does not contain unit tests, which can be found in /src/test, /src/wallet/test, etc.

This directory contains the following sets of tests:

• functional which test the functionality of palladiumd and palladium-qt by interacting with them through the RPC and P2P interfaces.
• util which tests the palladium utilities, currently only palladium-tx.
• lint which perform various static analysis checks.

The util tests are run as part of make check target. The functional tests and lint scripts can be run as explained in the sections below.

Running tests locally

Before tests can be run locally, Palladium Core must be built. See the building instructions for help.

Functional tests

Dependencies

The ZMQ functional test requires a python ZMQ library. To install it:

• on Unix, run sudo apt-get install python3-zmq
• on mac OS, run pip3 install pyzmq

Running the tests

Individual tests can be run by directly calling the test script, e.g.:

test/functional/feature_rbf.py

or can be run through the test_runner harness, eg:

test/functional/test_runner.py feature_rbf.py

You can run any combination (incl. duplicates) of tests by calling:

test/functional/test_runner.py <testname1> <testname2> <testname3> ...

Wildcard test names can be passed, if the paths are coherent and the test runner is called from a bash shell or similar that does the globbing. For example, to run all the wallet tests:

test/functional/test_runner.py test/functional/wallet*
functional/test_runner.py functional/wallet* (called from the test/ directory)
test_runner.py wallet* (called from the test/functional/ directory)

but not

test/functional/test_runner.py wallet*

Combinations of wildcards can be passed:

test/functional/test_runner.py ./test/functional/tool* test/functional/mempool*
test_runner.py tool* mempool*

Run the regression test suite with:

test/functional/test_runner.py

Run all possible tests with

test/functional/test_runner.py --extended

By default, up to 4 tests will be run in parallel by test_runner. To specify how many jobs to run, append --jobs=n

The individual tests and the test_runner harness have many command-line options. Run test/functional/test_runner.py -h to see them all.

Troubleshooting and debugging test failures

Palladium consensus differences and their impact on tests

Palladium diverges from Bitcoin Core in several consensus parameters. The test framework has been adapted accordingly, but some tests could not be fully ported yet. This section documents what changed and what to expect.

Key parameters (regtest)

Parameter	Bitcoin Core	Palladium
COINBASE_MATURITY	100	120
P2PKH version (mainnet)	0	55
P2PKH version (testnet)	111	127
P2SH version (testnet)	196	115
Bech32 HRP (mainnet)	bc	plm
Bech32 HRP (regtest)	bcrt	rplm
BIP34 / BIP66 / BIP65 / CSV	activated at specific heights	active from height 0

Because COINBASE_MATURITY is 120 instead of 100, the pre-mined cache chain is extended beyond the original 199 blocks to COINBASE_MATURITY + 99 = 219 blocks so that each test node still has enough mature coinbase outputs available at startup. Any test that previously hardcoded generate(101) or compared against a fixed block height of 200 has been updated to use the COINBASE_MATURITY constant exported by test_framework.util.

Skipped tests and known issues

The following tests are currently skipped or conditionally bypassed. Each entry explains why and what would be needed to re-enable it:

• feature_assumevalid.py — skipped entirely. The test builds blocks in Python and submits them via P2P. Palladium's PoW validation rejects these blocks because the nonce/nBits do not satisfy the chain's difficulty target. Re-enabling requires either a PoW-aware block solver in the test framework or a full rewrite that mines blocks via generatetoaddress RPC and then replays the chain.

• feature_block.py — skipped entirely. Same root cause: the full-block P2P test constructs blocks manually and they do not pass Palladium's consensus rules.

• p2p_unrequested_blocks.py — skipped entirely. The test relies on specific difficulty-rule behaviour that does not apply to the current Palladium regtest chain.

• feature_backwards_compatibility.py — skipped entirely. Requires compiled binaries from previous Palladium releases, which are not yet available.

• feature_versionbits_warning.py — skipped at runtime if the node does not emit the expected versionbits warning. This can happen when soft-forks are already active from genesis on regtest.

• feature_reindex.py — skipped at runtime if reindex fails to start cleanly. On some Palladium regtest configurations this is a known issue.

• p2p_dos_header_tree.py — skipped at runtime if the required header-data file is not available for the current chain.

• Several tests in feature_bip68_sequence.py, feature_csv_activation.py, feature_cltv.py, feature_dersig.py, and feature_segwit.py contain conditional blocks that skip sub-tests when the relevant soft-fork is already active at the starting height. On Palladium regtest BIP34/66/65/CSV and SegWit are active from height 0, so their pre-activation test paths are bypassed automatically.

• wallet_basic.py — the -reindex argument is commented out in one sub-test because reindex crashes on Palladium regtest under certain conditions.

If the full suite appears to stall near the end, run the remaining tests separately with -j1 and allow extra time for completion.

Local test updates (Palladium)

Summary of recent test-specific changes in this fork:

• feature_proxy.py was made tolerant to non-deterministic SOCKS5 command ordering and onion/DNS timing. The test now matches proxy commands by the expected destination and allows timeouts for onion/DNS checks to avoid hangs.
• feature_assumevalid.py is skipped because Python-constructed blocks do not currently satisfy Palladium's PoW validation, triggering bad-diffbits / incorrect proof-of-work.

What still needs to be fixed:

• Implement a PoW-aware block solver in the Python test framework for Palladium, or
• Rewrite feature_assumevalid.py to mine via generatetoaddress and rebuild the chain for P2P delivery while keeping the invalid-signature block logic.

Resource contention

The P2P and RPC ports used by the palladiumd nodes-under-test are chosen to make conflicts with other processes unlikely. However, if there is another palladiumd process running on the system (perhaps from a previous test which hasn't successfully killed all its palladiumd nodes), then there may be a port conflict which will cause the test to fail. It is recommended that you run the tests on a system where no other palladiumd processes are running.

On linux, the test framework will warn if there is another palladiumd process running when the tests are started.

If there are zombie palladiumd processes after test failure, you can kill them by running the following commands. Note that these commands will kill all palladiumd processes running on the system, so should not be used if any non-test palladiumd processes are being run.

killall palladiumd

or

pkill -9 palladiumd

Data directory cache

A pre-mined blockchain is generated the first time a functional test is run and is stored in test/cache. The chain length is COINBASE_MATURITY + 99 blocks (currently 219) so that every test node has enough mature coinbase outputs available immediately. This speeds up test startup times since new blockchains don't need to be generated for each test. However, the cache may get into a bad state, in which case tests will fail. If this happens, remove the cache directory (and make sure palladiumd processes are stopped as above):

rm -rf test/cache
killall palladiumd

Test logging

The tests contain logging at five different levels (DEBUG, INFO, WARNING, ERROR and CRITICAL). From within your functional tests you can log to these different levels using the logger included in the test_framework, e.g. self.log.debug(object). By default:

• when run through the test_runner harness, all logs are written to test_framework.log and no logs are output to the console.
• when run directly, all logs are written to test_framework.log and INFO level and above are output to the console.
• when run by our CI (Continuous Integration), no logs are output to the console. However, if a test fails, the test_framework.log and palladiumd debug.logs will all be dumped to the console to help troubleshooting.

These log files can be located under the test data directory (which is always printed in the first line of test output):

• <test data directory>/test_framework.log
• <test data directory>/node<node number>/regtest/debug.log.

The node number identifies the relevant test node, starting from node0, which corresponds to its position in the nodes list of the specific test, e.g. self.nodes[0].

To change the level of logs output to the console, use the -l command line argument.

test_framework.log and palladiumd debug.logs can be combined into a single aggregate log by running the combine_logs.py script. The output can be plain text, colorized text or html. For example:

test/functional/combine_logs.py -c <test data directory> | less -r

will pipe the colorized logs from the test into less.

Use --tracerpc to trace out all the RPC calls and responses to the console. For some tests (eg any that use submitblock to submit a full block over RPC), this can result in a lot of screen output.

By default, the test data directory will be deleted after a successful run. Use --nocleanup to leave the test data directory intact. The test data directory is never deleted after a failed test.

Attaching a debugger

A python debugger can be attached to tests at any point. Just add the line:

import pdb; pdb.set_trace()

anywhere in the test. You will then be able to inspect variables, as well as call methods that interact with the palladiumd nodes-under-test.

If further introspection of the palladiumd instances themselves becomes necessary, this can be accomplished by first setting a pdb breakpoint at an appropriate location, running the test to that point, then using gdb (or lldb on macOS) to attach to the process and debug.

For instance, to attach to self.node[1] during a run you can get the pid of the node within pdb.

(pdb) self.node[1].process.pid

Alternatively, you can find the pid by inspecting the temp folder for the specific test you are running. The path to that folder is printed at the beginning of every test run:

2017-06-27 14:13:56.686000 TestFramework (INFO): Initializing test directory /tmp/user/1000/testo9vsdjo3

Use the path to find the pid file in the temp folder:

cat /tmp/user/1000/testo9vsdjo3/node1/regtest/palladiumd.pid

Then you can use the pid to start gdb:

gdb /home/example/palladiumd <pid>

Note: gdb attach step may require ptrace_scope to be modified, or sudo preceding the gdb. See this link for considerations: https://www.kernel.org/doc/Documentation/security/Yama.txt

Profiling

An easy way to profile node performance during functional tests is provided for Linux platforms using perf.

Perf will sample the running node and will generate profile data in the node's datadir. The profile data can then be presented using perf report or a graphical tool like hotspot.

To generate a profile during test suite runs, use the --perf flag.

To see render the output to text, run

perf report -i /path/to/datadir/send-big-msgs.perf.data.xxxx --stdio | c++filt | less

For ways to generate more granular profiles, see the README in test/functional.

Util tests

Util tests can be run locally by running test/util/palladium-util-test.py. Use the -v option for verbose output.

Lint tests

Dependencies

Lint test	Dependency	Version used by CI	Installation
lint-python.sh	flake8	3.7.8	pip3 install flake8==3.7.8
lint-shell.sh	ShellCheck	0.6.0	details...
lint-shell.sh	yq	default	pip3 install yq
lint-spelling.sh	codespell	1.15.0	pip3 install codespell==1.15.0

Please be aware that on Linux distributions all dependencies are usually available as packages, but could be outdated.

Running the tests

Individual tests can be run by directly calling the test script, e.g.:

test/lint/lint-filenames.sh

You can run all the shell-based lint tests by running:

test/lint/lint-all.sh

Writing functional tests

You are encouraged to write functional tests for new or existing features. Further information about the functional test framework and individual tests is found in test/functional.