codingjoe / codingjoe/threadmill
ExponentialBackoff overflows timedelta above attempt 46
- Dominant language
- Python
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- 12
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- 1
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- 1d 1h
- Merged PRs (30d)
- 10
Description
`ExponentialBackoff.__call__` computes
```python
delay = min(self.base_delay * (self.factor**context.attempt), self.max_delay)
```
so the product is evaluated before `min()` clamps it. With the default shape (base delay 1 s, factor 2.0, max delay 1 h) the product exceeds the `timedelta` limit at attempt 47:
```
OverflowError: days=1628906115; must have magnitude <= 999999999
```
### Repro (threadmill 0.7.1)
```python
import datetime
from types import SimpleNamespace
from threadmill.retry import ExponentialBackoff
policy = ExponentialBackoff(
base_delay=datetime.timedelta(seconds=1),
max_delay=datetime.timedelta(hours=1),
factor=2.0,
max_retries=720,
)
def context(attempt):
error = SimpleNamespace(exception_class=ValueError)
return SimpleNamespace(attempt=attempt, task_result=SimpleNamespace(errors=[error]))
for attempt in range(1, 60):
try:
print(attempt, policy(context(attempt)))
except Exception as exc:
print(attempt, type(exc).__name__, exc)
break
```
Attempts 1 to 46 return a delay (2 s doubling to the 1 h cap at attempt 12), attempt 47 raises.
### Why it matters
`Executor.retry_delay` catches the exception, logs `Retry callback failed`, and returns `None`, so the backend acknowledges the result and the retry chain ends. The task looks like it exhausted its policy, but `max_retries` was never reached: a policy of 720 attempts really stops after 46 retries.
### Suggested fix
Clamp in seconds before building the `timedelta`, and derive the capped attempt count from `max_delay` so the exponential is never evaluated past the cap:
```python
seconds = min(
self.base_delay.total_seconds() * self.factor**context.attempt,
self.max_delay.total_seconds(),
)
return datetime.timedelta(seconds=seconds)
```
A plain `min()` on the two `timedelta` values does not help on its own, because the product still overflows before the comparison.
Found while bounding the spam scan retry budget in codingjoe/relay#230.
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