#1104695 rrdtool: 64-bit time_t transition requires a dump/restore of existing files

Package:
rrdtool
Source:
rrdtool
Description:
time-series data storage and display system (programs)
Submitter:
Marc Ballarin
Date:
2025-08-17 18:24:19 UTC
Severity:
normal
#1104695#5
Date:
2025-05-04 18:33:23 UTC
From:
To:
Dear Maintainer,

* What led up to the situation?
Upgrading a 32-Bit ARM system from Bookworm to Trixie
* What was the outcome of this action?
RRD files created in Bookworm are not readable in Trixie:
$ rrdtool info test.rrd
ERROR: 'test.rrd' is too small (should be 2986716 bytes)
* What outcome did you expect instead?
$ rrdtool info test.rrd
filename = "test.rrd"
...

This is somewhat expected behaviour, since RRD files are platform
dependent, but it might still be surprising to users.

IMHO, this behaviour, as well as the workaround, should be mentioned in
the release notes.

Workaround:
1. Stop writers and dump RRD to XML *before* upgrading:
$ rrdtool dump test.rrd > test.xml
2. Restore RRD from XML *after* upgrading:
$ rrdtool restore -f test.xml test.rrd

Regards,
Marc
#1104695#10
Date:
2025-08-10 18:49:59 UTC
From:
To:
I think it's a > minor severity bug for a package that is all about
historical data sequences to break access to such sequences without any
user-level documentation of why or what to do about it.

rrdtool should have a NEWS.Debian documenting it.