fix(workflows): guard the shell step's timeout check against OverflowError

[Noor-ul-ain001]

Problem

PR #3847 hardened the prompt step's timeout guard against a huge-int value, but its twin in the shell step — the step the prompt one was mirrored from — still has the hole.

math.isfinite(10**400) raises OverflowError: int too large to convert to float. A 400-digit YAML scalar is an int and is not a bool, so it clears every clause before isfinite() and raises there, escaping _timeout_error() as exactly the uncaught crash that helper exists to prevent.

steps:
  - id: qa
    type: shell
    run: echo hi
    timeout: 1000...0   # 400 digits

$ specify workflow run wf.yml
Traceback (most recent call last):
  ...
  File "src/specify_cli/workflows/engine.py", line 361, in _validate_steps
    step_errors = step_impl.validate(step_config)
  File "src/specify_cli/workflows/steps/shell/__init__.py", line 127
    or not math.isfinite(timeout)
OverflowError: int too large to convert to float

workflow_run calls engine.validate() before executing any step, so the OverflowError propagates out of validate_workflow and kills the command with a bare traceback that names neither the step nor the field, instead of the "Workflow validation failed" report.

execute() shares the same helper, so an unvalidated run raises there too — and the engine re-raises anything a step throws, aborting the whole workflow after earlier steps have already run their side effects.

The value is genuinely invalid rather than merely unrepresentable in the check: subprocess.run(timeout=10**400) raises the same OverflowError.

Unlike the prompt step, the shell step checks isfinite() before timeout <= 0, so a negative huge int (-(10**400)) crashes as well rather than being caught by the sign check.

Fix

Wrapped the condition in try/except OverflowError and treated the value as invalid, mirroring the prompt step's guard so both steps reject the same values with the same message. Now:

Workflow validation failed:
  - Shell step 'qa': 'timeout' must be a positive number of seconds, got 1000...0.

caught before the first step runs. Valid int/float timeouts, non-finite floats, bools, strings and non-positive values are unaffected — the existing clauses are unchanged.

Tests

Regression tests in TestShellStep:

• test_validate_rejects_huge_int_timeout — validate() rejects both signs of the huge int.
• test_validate_workflow_reports_huge_int_timeout — validate_workflow() reports it end to end, pinning the path the CLI actually takes rather than just the helper.
• test_execute_fails_cleanly_on_huge_int_timeout — execute() fails only that step, with subprocess.run patched to assert it is never reached.

Test-the-test: reverting the source change fails all three with OverflowError and leaves the rest of TestShellStep passing.

pytest tests/test_workflows.py shows no new failures against the baseline on this platform (the pre-existing Windows symlink-elevation and tmpdir failures are unchanged in count); the TestShellStep/TestPromptStep selection goes from 50 to 53 passing.

🤖 Generated with Claude Code

[Copilot]

Pull request overview

Guards shell-step timeout validation against huge integers that cause math.isfinite() to raise OverflowError.

Changes:

• Treats overflowing timeout values as invalid.
• Adds helper, workflow-level, and execution regression tests.

Show a summary per file

File	Description
src/specify_cli/workflows/steps/shell/__init__.py	Handles oversized integer timeouts safely.
tests/test_workflows.py	Covers validation and execution paths.

Review details

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• Files reviewed: 2/2 changed files
• Comments generated: 0
• Review effort level: Medium

[mnriem]

Thank you!