atime-on-use instead of mtime-on-use
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- Dominant language
- Rust
- Stars
- 15.5k
- Forks
- 3k
- Avg merge
- 23h 30m
- Merged PRs (30d)
- 51
Description
Problem
mtime is explicitly a modification time, updating it when nothing's actually changed can confuse backup tools, dependency analysis systems, file indexers, and so on.
Proposed Solution
atime is explicitly an access-time field. It doesn't signal modification so doesn't have the same side effects that updating mtime has. While many Linux systems disable or throttle atime updtes, atime can be updated explicitly updated using utimes() in the same circumstances mtime is updated.
Notes
I'd expect updating atime instead of mtime in this feature to be a trivial enhancement.
Contributor guide
First steps
- Read the whole issue, then the project's contributing guide.
- Comment on the issue to say you are picking it up — it saves two people doing the same work.
- Fork the repository and make your change on a branch.
- Open a pull request that references the issue number.
Research direction
Start by locating the Cargo implementation and tests for the feature that currently updates mtime, then inspect how utimes() is used or could be used in that path. Confirm which existing tests cover timestamp updates. Done means the feature updates atime rather than mtime when nothing has changed, with tests showing the expected timestamp behavior.
Written by the indexing model from the issue text.
Assessment
- Tech stack
- rust
- Domain
- build-system
- Issue type
- Feature
- Difficulty
- 3/5
- Estimated time
- 1-2 days
- Activity status
- Quiet
- Clarity
- Mostly clear
- Newbie friendliness
- 52/100