tarfile touches directories twice

[loewis]

BPO	10184
Nosy	@loewis, @gustaebel, @vstinner, @merwok
Files	tarfile.diff tarfile-extract-directory-test.diff tarfile2.diff

^{Note: these values reflect the state of the issue at the time it was migrated and might not reflect the current state.}

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GitHub fields:

assignee = 'https://github.com/gustaebel'
closed_at = <Date 2010-11-01.21:39:48.827>
created_at = <Date 2010-10-23.19:06:31.856>
labels = []
title = 'tarfile touches directories twice'
updated_at = <Date 2010-11-01.21:39:48.827>
user = 'https://github.com/loewis'

bugs.python.org fields:

activity = <Date 2010-11-01.21:39:48.827>
actor = 'loewis'
assignee = 'lars.gustaebel'
closed = True
closed_date = <Date 2010-11-01.21:39:48.827>
closer = 'loewis'
components = []
creation = <Date 2010-10-23.19:06:31.856>
creator = 'loewis'
dependencies = []
files = ['19345', '19352', '19354']
hgrepos = []
issue_num = 10184
keywords = ['patch']
message_count = 5.0
messages = ['119467', '119510', '119524', '119545', '120182']
nosy_count = 4.0
nosy_names = ['loewis', 'lars.gustaebel', 'vstinner', 'eric.araujo']
pr_nums = []
priority = 'normal'
resolution = 'accepted'
stage = None
status = 'closed'
superseder = None
type = None
url = 'https://bugs.python.org/issue10184'
versions = ['Python 3.1', 'Python 2.7', 'Python 3.2']

[loewis]

When extracting, the time stamps of directories are modified twice: once when creating the directories, and then once in reverse order when done.
The first utimes call is redundant; it also causes issues with a buggy NFS server, see

http://www.python.org/dev/buildbot/3.1/builders/AMD64%20debian%20parallel%203.1/builds/147/steps/test/logs/stdio

(specifically, touching a file twice with the same second-resolution time stamp will increase the microsecond counter).

The attached patch works around the issue; regardless of the NFS bug, I think that the redundant call should be eliminated.

[gustaebel]

The patch goes a bit too far. Though it solves this particular problem with the way TarFile.extractall() works, it breaks TarFile.extract(). Running the testsuite does not expose this, simply because there's no testcase :-(

Please see the attached testcase I just wrote which illustrates the problem.

[loewis]

I see. Here is an updated version that makes the touch operations optional.

[gustaebel]

I'm not entirely happy with the name of the "touch" argument. Apart from it being nice and short, I think it's a little too unix-y and might be misleading because it is not only about setting the modification time as the name implies, but also owner and mode. My proposal would be "restore_attrs" or "set_attrs" which isn't half as nice as "touch", but sums up better what's actually done. I leave this up to you.

I think the testcase wouldn't work on Windows the way it is now, would it?

Apart from these minor issues the patch gets my blessing, go ahead ;-)

[loewis]

This is now committed as r86102. I opted to call the parameter set_attrs.