Re: [PATCH] gitlog-to-changelog: Make output reproducible.

[Simon Josefsson]

fre 2024-04-12 klockan 18:47 +0200 skrev Bruno Haible:
> The ChangeLogs are not random data. They are text files meant to be
> read
> and interpreted by humans. Shoving a "let's use GMT for everyone"
> attitude
> here is not the right way to handle the diversity of time zones.
> 
> There was a problem already before, in gitlog-to-changelog. Namely,
> what
> if a committer sits in California and the release manager, who
> creates the
> tarball, sits in England or Germany? The same effect as above would
> occur.
> But your change now made it even worse: Even the release manager
> cannot
> override the time zone.
> 
> The real fix, IMO, is to use 'git log --format=fuller', and convert
> the CommitDate (*) by removing the time zone. In the example above:
> 
>   CommitDate: Sat Mar 16 22:29:02 2024 -0700
>   -> 2024-03-16
> 
> This way, each committer's days will be correctly represented.

I agree with this: ChangeLog dates should correspond to the date when
it was commited by the commiter, and since ChangeLog entries doesn't
carry time zone data by nature it is local time.  That approach is also
fully reproducible, which was my main concern, and doesn't depend on
the release manager's time zone.  Indeed neither the old behaviour and
the current behaviour follow what I believe you and me agree on.  At
least the current behaviour is reproducible regardless of release
manager time zone.  I'll try to come up with a fix.

/Simon

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