Allow specifying make arguments for testing

[henningkayser]

I ran into an issue where several integration tests using Gazebo caused a memory conflict resulting in the test runs being blocked and to fail. By limiting the number of make jobs to 1 (using -j1 inspired by ros-industrial/industrial_ci#446) all tests succeeded. I kept the new variable name generic, since I'm sure there are many more use cases for custom test options.

[mamoll]

Would it be possible to achieve the same thing by setting the environment variable MAKEFLAGS to -j1?

[henningkayser]

Would it be possible to achieve the same thing by setting the environment variable MAKEFLAGS to -j1?

Probably, but then you would apply it for all build steps

[v4hn]

No harm in having the option to do that.

Still, parallel testing should be possible!
The issue you reference was about some state machine code, so I guess you experience different errors?
Could you at least show an error message?
If you run multiple gazebo tests in parallel you probably have to ensure individual server URIs for the tests to keep nodes from talking to the wrong server?

[rhaschke]

To stay with the existing variable naming for tests, I suggest renaming the new parameter to TEST_MAKEFLAGS. I agree with Michael that you should actually try to fix your broken tests.
It should be possible to run multiple gazebo instances in parallel, isn't it?
Of course, you might run into memory limitations. Is that your actual problem?

[henningkayser]

No harm in having the option to do that.

Still, parallel testing should be possible!
The issue you reference was about some state machine code, so I guess you experience different errors?
Could you at least show an error message?

Wasn't showing any errors, neither when running on Travis nor locally.

If you run multiple gazebo tests in parallel you probably have to ensure individual server URIs for the tests to keep nodes from talking to the wrong server?

Thanks, I didn't think about this.

To stay with the existing variable naming for tests, I suggest renaming the new parameter to TEST_MAKEFLAGS. I agree with Michael that you should actually try to fix your broken tests.

Will do, fixed the tests also