Re: meaning of "Automatic date update in version.in" commits

[Matthias Klose <doko at ubuntu dot com>]

On 20.09.2017 19:23, Petr Ovtchenkov wrote:
> On Wed, 20 Sep 2017 18:16:45 +0200
> Andreas Schwab <schwab@linux-m68k.org> wrote:
> 
>> On Sep 20 2017, Petr Ovtchenkov <ptr@void-ptr.info> wrote:
>>
>>> What is the meaning of "Automatic date update in version.in" commits?
>>> I mean commits like f625a739e5.
>>
>> It is used to name the shared libbfd and libopcodes, since there is no
>> stable ABI.
>>
>>> This commits litter commits tree and create problems for  	
>>> deterministic, bit-identical and/or verifiable builds.
>>
>> Why is that a problem?  The version is fixed for a particular source
>> snapshot.
>>
> 
> It's looks as a problem indeed:
>    - garbage in commits
>    - disorientation, when date present in SONAME
>        0x000000000000000e (SONAME)             Library soname: [libbfd-2.29.0.20170729.so]

this is correct, and it's usually set to not include the date for a releases, an
exception being the 2.29.1 release, but things happen.

> You see:
> 
> git show 3110f4be18a2
>   commit 3110f4be18a2f3b9fcd9663ed1dd141bbd6ed14f
>   Author: GDB Administrator <gdbadmin@sourceware.org>
>   Date:   Wed Sep 20 00:01:01 2017 +0000
> 
>       Automatic date update in version.in
> 
>   diff --git a/bfd/version.h b/bfd/version.h
>   index 3405e42..955269f 100644
>   --- a/bfd/version.h
>   +++ b/bfd/version.h
>   @@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
>   -#define BFD_VERSION_DATE 20170919
>   +#define BFD_VERSION_DATE 20170920
>    #define BFD_VERSION @bfd_version@
>    #define BFD_VERSION_STRING  @bfd_version_package@ @bfd_version_string@
>    #define REPORT_BUGS_TO @report_bugs_to@
> 
> git show f625a739     
>   commit f625a739e567f0110b2675539b7a0e5d5f67c5dc
>   Author: GDB Administrator <gdbadmin@sourceware.org>
>   Date:   Wed Sep 20 00:01:22 2017 +0000
> 
>       Automatic date update in version.in
> 
>   diff --git a/bfd/version.h b/bfd/version.h
>   index 3405e42..955269f 100644
>   --- a/bfd/version.h
>   +++ b/bfd/version.h
>   @@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
>   -#define BFD_VERSION_DATE 20170919
>   +#define BFD_VERSION_DATE 20170920
>    #define BFD_VERSION @bfd_version@
>    #define BFD_VERSION_STRING  @bfd_version_package@ @bfd_version_string@
>    #define REPORT_BUGS_TO @report_bugs_to@
> 
> git diff 3110f4be18a2 f625a739
> ...
> Ooops....
> 
> This approch produce ambiguity, but try to conceal it.

Feel free to limit the bumps to exactly one after another commit.

Matthias