Inconsistencies between --select "resource_type:test" and --resource-type test`

[dbeatty10]

Originally posted by @seub in #10267 (comment):

Piggybacking, I noted similar bugs:

dbt ls --resource-type=test
dbt ls --select resource_type:test

The first command picks up unit tests, the second doesn't.

dbt ls --resource-type=model
dbt ls --select resource_type:model

The first command only picks up models, the second picks up models and tests.

Tested with dbt 1.8.3

[dbeatty10]

Thanks for bringing up both of these examples @seub ! 🏆

Inconsistency 1

The inconsistency between these two was resolved by #10730 and will be available in dbt-core v1.9:

dbt ls --resource-type test
dbt ls --select resource_type:test

Inconsistency 2

The output of these two differs, but after digging into it actually looks like the behavior we expect:

dbt ls --resource-type model
dbt ls --select resource_type:model

Like you observed, the former only includes models whereas the latter includes all models plus their associated unit tests and data tests.

The reason is that the resource_type selection method applies before any indirect selection of associated unit tests and data tests. Then the --resource-type flag allows further filtering of all directly and indirectly selected nodes afterwards.

So this actually isn't an inconsistency after all, just a difference in how the resource_type and the --resource-type flag shape the final set of nodes to operate upon.

Summary

I'm going to close this as "not planned" since the 1st case was covered by #10727 and the 2nd case is expected behavior.