Re: [PATCH] initscripts: Properly handle new timestamp format

[Richard Purdie <richard.purdie@linuxfoundation.org>]

On Thu, 2012-03-01 at 08:27 -0700, Gary Thomas wrote:
> On 2012-03-01 08:11, Gary Thomas wrote:
> > On 2012-03-01 07:59, Richard Purdie wrote:
> >> On Thu, 2012-03-01 at 07:43 -0700, Gary Thomas wrote:
> >>> Recent changes have attempted to make consistant use of /etc/timestamp
> >>> In particular
> >>> 5aab665 initscripts: Make /etc/timestamp consistent again.
> >>> 173a48f image.bbclass: Ensure timestamp matches format used in initscripts after recent changes
> >>>
> >>> This new format can cause problems as the value is too large for
> >>> most [32 bit] machines. Work around this by only comparing the
> >>> YYYYMMDD portion (which does fit in 32 bits). Also, the new format
> >>> is not directly compatible with the 'date' command line, so it
> >>> must be reformatted for use.
> >>>
> >>> Signed-off-by: Gary Thomas<gary@mlbassoc.com>
> >>> ---
> >>> .../initscripts/initscripts-1.0/bootmisc.sh | 4 ++--
> >>> 1 files changed, 2 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)
> >>
> >> I merged the changes to busybox in relation to this. Is this patch still
> >> needed?
> >
> > Let me check - I didn't see the related busybox change.
> >
> 
> I missed the busybox change because there was no PR bump :-(
> 
> The problem with the change turning off CONFIG_FEATURE_DATE_COMPAT is that
> now 'date' from busybox works one way and 'date' from coreutils works another.
> 
> Using coreutils:
> 
> root@cobra8148p81:~# date 201203011520
> date: invalid date `201203011520'
> root@cobra8148p81:~# date 030115202012
> Thu Mar  1 15:20:00 UTC 2012
> root@cobra8148p81:~# ls -l /bin/date
> lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 14 Mar  1 15:14 /bin/date -> date.coreutils
> 
> Using busybox:
> 
> root@cobra8148p81:~# ln -s /bin/busybox /tmp/date
> root@cobra8148p81:~# /tmp/date 201203011520
> Thu Mar  1 15:20:00 UTC 2012
> 
> I think the best thing would be to turn CONFIG_FEATURE_DATE_COMPAT back
> on along with my reformatting change.
> 
> I can make an updated patch if you agree.

Is this going to cause us a problem in real world usage? I'd hope in the
general case we use standard formatting?

I have to admit I'm getting more than a little frustrated with what
seems like a continual set of changes bouncing this format around in
different directions :(.

Cheers,

Richard