[Reproducible-builds] Bug#790801: txt2man: please support timestamps from environment

[Reiner Herrmann]

Source: txt2man
Version: 1.5.6-3
Severity: wishlist
Tags: patch
User: reproducible-builds at lists.alioth.debian.org
Usertags: toolchain timestamps
X-Debbugs-Cc: reproducible-builds at lists.alioth.debian.org

Hi!

When no explicit date is specified on the command line, txt2man currently embeds
the current time into generated manpages.
For the Reproducible Builds effort we are proposing an environment variable [1],
that will contain a deterministic epoch timestamp (based on the latest debian/changelog
entry) that could be used.
We hope that it will soon be automatically exported by debhelper.
With the attached patch packages using txt2man would then automatically generate
reproducible manpages (instead of having to adapt each package to explicitely pass a
timestamp).

Btw. help2man also recently added support for this [2]. :-)

Regards,
 Reiner

[1]: https://wiki.debian.org/ReproducibleBuilds/TimestampsProposal
[2]: https://bugs.debian.org/787444

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