[Pgpool-general] Meaning of connection_life_time?

[Peter Eisentraut]

I'm trying to figure out the exact meaning of the connection_life_time 
parameter.  It is described as "life time for each idle connection", but in 
testing I also see connections being expired that have not been idle for the 
specified time.  In the debug output I do see the alarm being reset every 
time a query is run, and these two observations are not really consistent.  
Can anyone clarify the meaning of this parameter? Does it simply kill the 
connection after a specified time, or does the connection have to be unused 
for the specified time, or something else?