Hi,

Whilst working on the Reproducible Builds effort [0], we noticed that
libecoli could not be built reproducibly.

This is because the generated manual pages contain the current time.
I've attached a patch that will use SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH instead, falling
back to the current time if this environment variable is not available.
This patch is suitable for forwarding upstream.

(I also included a patch that will ensure the package is reproducible
regardless of the build directory, although this is strictly optional
as we are not doing build dir variation testing at the moment.)

 [0] https://reproducible-builds.org/


Regards,

Hi Chris,

I had uploaded 0.11.7-1 a few days ago with a fix for that
reproducibility issue but it seems the upload wasn't processed.

rjarry@ringo:~/debian/libecoli debian/latest$ dput ../libecoli_0.11.7-1_source.changes
Package libecoli was already uploaded to ftp-master
If you want to upload nonetheless, use --force or remove ../libecoli_0.11.7-1_source.ftp-master.upload

I'll try again.

rjarry@ringo:~/debian/libecoli debian/latest$ dput --force ../libecoli_0.11.7-1_source.changes
Uploading libecoli using ftp to ftp-master (host: ftp.upload.debian.org; directory: /pub/UploadQueue/)
running allowed-distribution: check whether a local profile permits uploads to the target distribution
running protected-distribution: warn before uploading to distributions where a special policy applies
running checksum: verify checksums before uploading
running suite-mismatch: check the target distribution for common errors
running gpg: check GnuPG signatures before the upload
Uploading libecoli_0.11.7-1.dsc
Uploading libecoli_0.11.7.orig.tar.xz
Uploading libecoli_0.11.7-1.debian.tar.xz
Uploading libecoli_0.11.7-1_source.buildinfo
Uploading libecoli_0.11.7-1_source.changes

Do you know what could be blocking?

Hi Chris,

I had uploaded 0.11.7-1 a few days ago with a fix for that
reproducibility issue but it seems the upload wasn't processed.

rjarry@ringo:~/debian/libecoli debian/latest$ dput ../libecoli_0.11.7-1_source.changes
Package libecoli was already uploaded to ftp-master
If you want to upload nonetheless, use --force or remove ../libecoli_0.11.7-1_source.ftp-master.upload

I'll try again.

rjarry@ringo:~/debian/libecoli debian/latest$ dput --force ../libecoli_0.11.7-1_source.changes
Uploading libecoli using ftp to ftp-master (host: ftp.upload.debian.org; directory: /pub/UploadQueue/)
running allowed-distribution: check whether a local profile permits uploads to the target distribution
running protected-distribution: warn before uploading to distributions where a special policy applies
running checksum: verify checksums before uploading
running suite-mismatch: check the target distribution for common errors
running gpg: check GnuPG signatures before the upload
Uploading libecoli_0.11.7-1.dsc
Uploading libecoli_0.11.7.orig.tar.xz
Uploading libecoli_0.11.7-1.debian.tar.xz
Uploading libecoli_0.11.7-1_source.buildinfo
Uploading libecoli_0.11.7-1_source.changes

Do you know what could be blocking?

Hi Robin,

I've not encountered this particular error myself. However, common issues
for why uploads aren't processed are because of GPG signatures and because
the target distribution is incorrect. If you jump on the #debian-ftp IRC
channel, one of the admins will be able to look at the logs.


Best wishes,

It seems like the upload was eventually processed, although the fix
included was only a partial fix.

diff --git a/doc/gen-man-pages.sh b/doc/gen-man-pages.sh
index 7112ba6..7bc1969 100755
--- a/doc/gen-man-pages.sh
+++ b/doc/gen-man-pages.sh
@@ -35,7 +35,7 @@ for xml in $groups; do
                -S "2010" \
                -d "$xml_dir" \
                -o "$output_dir" \
-               -D "$(date +%Y-%m-%d ${SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH:+-d @${SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH}})" \
+               -D "$(date +%Y-%m-%d ${SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH:+-u -d @${SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH}})" \
                "$xml" || [ "$?" -gt 128 ]
 done

The -u (a.k.a. --utc) argument to date is needed for the build to be
independent of the timezone:

https://tests.reproducible-builds.org/debian/rb-pkg/forky/amd64/diffoscope-results/libecoli.html

  ./usr/share/man/man3/ec_comp.3.gz

  .TH·EC_COMP·3·2026-06-11·"libecoli"·"Libecoli·Programmer's·Manual"
  vs.
  .TH·EC_COMP·3·2026-06-12·"libecoli"·"Libecoli·Programmer's·Manual"

  Copyright·(C)·2010-2027·Olivier·Matz,·Robin·Jarry.
  vs.
  Copyright·(C)·2010-2026·Olivier·Matz,·Robin·Jarry.

Unfortunately, the Copyright date range at the end of the manpage still
includes the year it was built and not the year from SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH,
so if the package is built in a different calendar year, it will not be
reproducible. I have not figured out a fix for that yet, but am looking
into it...


live well,
  vagrant

...

I should have waited to send the email! It just required another
argument to doxygen2man:

diff --git a/doc/gen-man-pages.sh b/doc/gen-man-pages.sh
index 7bc1969..3d6710f 100755
--- a/doc/gen-man-pages.sh
+++ b/doc/gen-man-pages.sh
@@ -36,6 +36,7 @@ for xml in $groups; do
                -d "$xml_dir" \
                -o "$output_dir" \
                -D "$(date +%Y-%m-%d ${SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH:+-u -d @${SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH}})" \
+               -Y "$(date +%Y ${SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH:+-u -d @${SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH}})" \
                "$xml" || [ "$?" -gt 128 ]
 done


I also noticed another part of the original patch that was not included,
which has to do with build paths rather than timestamps. It is fairly
minor as all the test infrastructure no longer tests build path
differences, but it would be nice to include otherwise there are
pointless build paths embedded in your documeentation!

diff --git a/doc/Doxyfile.in b/doc/Doxyfile.in
index 7d4097d..6f5e489 100644
--- a/doc/Doxyfile.in
+++ b/doc/Doxyfile.in
@@ -26,7 +26,7 @@ GENERATE_DEPRECATEDLIST = YES
 INTERNAL_DOCS           = NO
 VERBATIM_HEADERS        = NO
 ALPHABETICAL_INDEX      = NO
-FULL_PATH_NAMES         = YES
+FULL_PATH_NAMES         = NO
 STRIP_FROM_PATH         = @TOPDIR@/include
 STRIP_FROM_INC_PATH     = @TOPDIR@/include
 WARN_AS_ERROR           = NO


With those three fixes applied (using "date -u" with doxygen2man, and
also passing the -Y argument to doxygen2man, and disabling the
FULL_PATH_NAMES), I think this should become fully reproducible! :)


live well,
  vagrant

We believe that the bug you reported is fixed in the latest version of
libecoli, which is due to be installed in the Debian FTP archive.

A summary of the changes between this version and the previous one is
attached.

Thank you for reporting the bug, which will now be closed.  If you
have further comments please address them to 1140567@bugs.debian.org,
and the maintainer will reopen the bug report if appropriate.

Debian distribution maintenance software
pp.
Robin Jarry <robin@jarry.cc> (supplier of updated libecoli package)

(This message was generated automatically at their request; if you
believe that there is a problem with it please contact the archive
administrators by mailing ftpmaster@ftp-master.debian.org)
Format: 1.8
Date: Fri, 02 Oct 2026 11:55:59 +0000
Source: libecoli
Architecture: source
Version: 0.11.8-1
Distribution: unstable
Urgency: medium
Maintainer: Robin Jarry <robin@jarry.cc>
Changed-By: Robin Jarry <robin@jarry.cc>
Closes: 1140567
Changes:
 libecoli (0.11.8-1) unstable; urgency=medium
 .
   * New upstream release. (Closes: #1140567)
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 a11892a624e9a4f5c34decd372a4b742540bed50 5144 libecoli_0.11.8-1.debian.tar.xz
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