git/list[1] front-page[2] threads[3] people[4] search[5] about
 

[PATCH/RFC] ident: die on bogus date format

From
Jeff King <peff@peff.net>
Date
Dec 13, 2010, 17:02 UTC
Message-ID
<20101213170225.GA16033@sigill.intra.peff.net>
In-Reply-To
<loom.20101213T161633-993@post.gmane.org>
On Mon, Dec 13, 2010 at 03:20:07PM +0000, Sergio wrote:
Show 9 quoted lines
> on 1.7.3.3, I have noticed that git --commit silently ignores the 
> --date=<date> switch if <date> is not in the current format.
> 
> for instance
> 
> git --commit --amend --date="10.11.2010" creates a commit with the current
> date and time, because the --date argument misses the time.
> 
> possibly, it would be better to stop with an error message.

Yeah, we should definitely be flagging the error. This patch fixes it, but I'm not sure if it is optimal (see below).

-- >8 --
Subject: [PATCH/RFC] ident: die on bogus date format

If the user gives "git commit --date=foobar", we silently ignore the --date flag. We should note the error.

This patch puts the fix at the lowest level of fmt_ident, which means it also handles GIT_AUTHOR_DATE=foobar, as well.

There are two down-sides to this approach:
  1. Technically this breaks somebody doing something like
     "git commit --date=now", which happened to work because
     bogus data is the same as "now". Though we do
     explicitly handle the empty string, so anybody passing
     an empty variable through the environment will still
     work.
     If the error is too much, perhaps it can be downgraded
     to a warning?
  2. The error checking happens _after_ the commit message
     is written, which can be annoying to the user. We can
     put explicit checks closer to the beginning of
     git-commit, but that feels a little hack-ish; suddenly
     git-commit has to care about how fmt_ident works. Maybe
     we could simply call fmt_ident earlier?
Signed-off-by: Jeff King <peff@peff.net>
---
 ident.c           |    6 ++++--
 t/t7501-commit.sh |    4 ++++
 2 files changed, 8 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-)
diff --git a/ident.c b/ident.c
index 9e24388..1c4adb0 100644
--- a/ident.c
+++ b/ident.c
@@ -217,8 +217,10 @@ const char *fmt_ident(const char *name, const char *email,
 	}
 
 	strcpy(date, git_default_date);
-	if (!name_addr_only && date_str)
-		parse_date(date_str, date, sizeof(date));
+	if (!name_addr_only && date_str && date_str[0]) {
+		if (parse_date(date_str, date, sizeof(date)) < 0)
+			die("invalid date format: %s", date_str);
+	}
 
 	i = copy(buffer, sizeof(buffer), 0, name);
 	i = add_raw(buffer, sizeof(buffer), i, " <");
diff --git a/t/t7501-commit.sh b/t/t7501-commit.sh
index 8297cb4..8980738 100755
--- a/t/t7501-commit.sh
+++ b/t/t7501-commit.sh
@@ -230,6 +230,10 @@ test_expect_success 'amend commit to fix date' '
 
 '
 
+test_expect_success 'commit complains about bogus date' '
+	test_must_fail git commit --amend --date=10.11.2010
+'
+
 test_expect_success 'sign off (1)' '
 
 	echo 1 >positive &&
-- 
1.7.3.3.784.gccc31.dirty
Previous: SergioNext: Sergio Callegari
Message 2 of 5 in “Git silently ignores --date when data is not in the correct format”
  1. SergioDec 13, 2010
  2. ident: die on bogus date formatJeff King, Dec 13, 2010
  3. Sergio CallegariDec 13, 2010
  4. Junio C HamanoDec 15, 2010
  5. Junio C HamanoDec 21, 2010

Read the whole thread, see it on lore, or plain text.

$ cat FOOTERMessages come from the public archive at lore.kernel.org/git, fetched every hour. The front page is chosen and written each morning by an AI editor and can be wrong; the threads themselves are the record. About and API. For agents: an MCP server at https://gitlist.dev/mcp, and any thread, story or person page as Markdown by adding .md to its URL (or sending Accept: text/markdown). Details in /llms.txt.