tarfile does not set the creation date and time of the extracted
directories, all extracted directories will get the date and time of the
extraction, although in the source archive (created by tarfile) the
creation date and time is stored for directories, too.

I cannot reproduce this; it works fine for me. Can you provide a test case?

Sure, see the attachment.

Just call:

python pack.py unpack directory.tar 

You should get the folder named "directory" dated to the current date
and time.

I still cannot reproduce this:

martin@mira:/tmp/h$ ls -l
insgesamt 12
-rw-r--r-- 1 martin martin  172 10. Dez 08:40 directory.tar
-rw-r--r-- 1 martin martin 1497 25. Feb 2008  pack.py
-rw-r--r-- 1 martin martin 1129 10. Dez 08:58 testcase.zip
martin@mira:/tmp/h$ date
Mi 10. Dez 09:02:49 CET 2008
martin@mira:/tmp/h$ python pack.py unpack directory.tar

Unpack done.
martin@mira:/tmp/h$ ls -l
insgesamt 16
drwxrwxrwx 2 martin martin 4096 10. Dez 08:38 directory
-rw-r--r-- 1 martin martin  172 10. Dez 08:40 directory.tar
-rw-r--r-- 1 martin martin 1497 25. Feb 2008  pack.py
-rw-r--r-- 1 martin martin 1129 10. Dez 08:58 testcase.zip

As you can see, directory is dated 8:38, even though the current time is
9:02.

Sorry, I thought that by selecting component "Windows" from the first
combo box I specify that this problem occurs on a windows machine. I run
win xp sp2. 

As you can see in the screenshot, the unpacked directory has the current
date and time.

Can you debug this? Where specifically does the problem occur?

Directory times are explicitly not set. The comment in TarFile.utime()
says that it is an error on Windows to use utime on directories. I am no
Windows expert, so I don't know if that is still true.

Apparently it is not. os.utime() was fixed for Windows in Python 2.5
(r45925), so it should be possible for tarfile to set directory times
now. I will prepare a patch.

Wooow, you're fast! :-)

We use Python 2.5 (r25:51908, Sep 19 2006, 09:52:17) [MSC v.1310 32 bit
(Intel)] on win32, so that will help us!

Thank you,
Robert

On Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 12:04 PM, Lars Gustäbel <report@bugs.python.org>wrote:

>
> Lars Gustäbel <lars@gustaebel.de> added the comment:
>
> Apparently it is not. os.utime() was fixed for Windows in Python 2.5
> (r45925), so it should be possible for tarfile to set directory times
> now. I will prepare a patch.
>
> _______________________________________
> Python tracker <report@bugs.python.org>
> <http://bugs.python.org/issue4616>
> _______________________________________
>

I checked the necessary changes in the trunk and the py3k,
release26-maint, and release30-maint branches (r67717-r67720). Thank you
for your report.