Retries; maxAttempts and interval attributes about specification

[tsurdilo]

@jorgenj Thanks for the question! maxAttempts can limit the number of attempts when interval defines an unbounded number of repetitions , for example R/PT15M. In the param description the example is indeed somewhat confusing so I will update that asap.
Using maxAttempts even if interval is bounded could be useful in testing for example.

I am currently revising the error handling / timeouts / retries sections and will definitely include this as well as many more clarifications in the docs.

[jorgenj]

I can't tell if there's a reason why I might use interval field to limit retries over using the separate maxAttempts attribute, perhaps some guidance on when/why a user might use one vs. the other would be helpful to add to the docs?

One advantage I see over the separate fields is it's a nice succinct way to define a basic retry policy (retry 5 times with 2 minutes in between -> "R5/2M").

On the other hand, the concern is that this might get confusing when combined with functionality like progressive backoff. For example:

{ "interval": "R5/PT15M",
"multiplier": "1M"
}

At first glance, it's not clear whether this will have 15M between every retry, or follow an increasing series of backoffs (I personally would assume the progressive series (15m, 16m, 17m, ...)).

[tsurdilo]

@jorgenj all good points I am using your ideas atm as part of the workflow error docs updates. Will ping you to review PRs that have updates asap.

[tsurdilo]

@jorgenj i have taken the first step on this with just a small change interval/delay in PR #175.

Once that pr is merged we can move forward on the overall retry definition improvements.

[jorgenj]

@tsurdilo I'm new to github issues, is it reasonable to assign this task to me? I'm not sure how to do that, is that something you can do?

[tsurdilo]

@jorgenj done

[github-actions]

This issue has been automatically marked as stale because it has not had recent activity. It will be closed if no further activity occurs. Thank you for your contributions.