171: How and why I use pytest's xfail - Paul Ganssle
Paul Ganssle, is a software developer at Google, core Python dev, and open source maintainer for many projects, has some thoughts about pytest's xfail.
He was an early skeptic of using xfail, and is now an proponent of the feature.
In this episode, we talk about some open source workflows that are possible because of xfail.
He was an early skeptic of using xfail, and is now an proponent of the feature.
In this episode, we talk about some open source workflows that are possible because of xfail.
Special Guest: Paul Ganssle.
Links:
- How and why I use pytest's xfail — Paul's blog post mentioned in the episode
- Craft Minimal Bug Reports — Matthew Rocklin's article
- episode 111: Subtests in Python with unittest and pytest - Paul Ganssle
- episode 165: pytest xfail policy and workflow
- episode 166: unittest expectedFailure and xfail
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- Then pytest Booster Rockets can help with advanced parametrization and building plugins.
- Whether you need to get started with pytest today, or want to power up your pytest skills, PythonTest has a course for you.
Creators and Guests

Guest
Paul Ganssle
Programmer working @Google in NYC. Maintainer of python-dateutil, Python core developer and general FOSS contributor.
