SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH conflicts with variable used by rpm.

[Rx1513]

Hello! Currently I'm trying to build lcov 2.3.1 but get this error when running tests:

genhtml: ERROR: (inconsistent) File "<MY_PATH>/lcov/tests/gendiffcov/simple/annotate.cpp": 
'SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH=1744893796' (2025-04-17T12:43:16) is older than annotate time '2025-04-17T12:45:11+00:00'

I guess it's because of different formating used.

[henry2cox]

What platform and compiler/toolchain version?

The tests appear to work correctly when run on github, as well as when I run them locally.
You may want to run make clean as well - just in case there is some leftover shrapnel that is getting in the way.

[Rx1513]

What platform and compiler/toolchain version?

ALTLinux Sisyphus isolated chroot with folowing dependecies:

- gcc - 14.2.1
- perl - 5.38.2
- Capture::Tiny - 0.50
- DateTime - 1.66
- Devel::Cover - 1.44
- Module::Load::Conditional - 0.74
- TimeDate - 2.33

You may want to run make clean as well - just in case there is some leftover shrapnel that is getting in the way.

Build environment complitely rebuilt every time so that's not the case.

[Rx1513]

Well, the problem was in cached epoch variable after previous stage. The solution is just to unset SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH. Sorry for interrupting.

[Rx1513]

After a little investigation, it turns out that this variable conflicts with the rpm SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH parameter, which indicates the start of the build stage, while it seems that one of the tests expects it to be newer than the build time or mtime, which is always false.

[henry2cox]

Could you clarify exactly how to reproduce the error you see?
That may mean not only the specific steps, but also platform, toolchain versions, etc.

[Rx1513]

To build package I use rpm spec similar to rpm/lcov.spec but with extra %check section which contains:

%check
make clean
make test

Environment I use:
Distro: ALT Linux
rpm - 4.13.0.1 with some distro related fixes.
perl - 5.38.4
gcc - 14.2.1
make - 4.4.0
Other packages stays the same.

[Rx1513]

When I start building a package, rpm sets the SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH equal to the build start time, while the test creates annotate.cpp which will always be newer than SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH. So that's all the problem.

[henry2cox]

Sounds like you need to talk to the maintainers of RPM - to ask them to either change/remove this behaviour, to to add an option to not do it.
Alternately, perhaps you can simply unset that variable in your %check section before you call 'make check'. That seems like a reasonable approach as it sounds as if that section is specifically added to your lcov rpm, and you know that the variable interferes with something that lcov is trying to test.

In any event: it seems like the lcov implementation is doing exactly what it was documented to do: if you set SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH: then use that value.
This does not seem like an issue that lcov can or should work around.

[Rx1513]

Sounds like you need to talk to the maintainers of RPM - to ask them to either change/remove this behaviour, to to add an option to not do it. Alternately, perhaps you can simply unset that variable in your %check section before you call 'make check'. That seems like a reasonable approach as it sounds as if that section is specifically added to your lcov rpm, and you know that the variable interferes with something that lcov is trying to test.

Fine. Thanks for your time.