Attach patch catchs errors on time(), ftime(), localtime() and clock(). It changes floattime() and _Py_gettimeofday() signature: result now indicates if an error occurred or not, and these function now directly raise an exception.

Catching time() error is maybe overflow: modern version of its manual page don't mention errors.

New changeset 9ee4a104e33d by Victor Stinner in branch 'default':
Issue bpo-13847: time.localtime() and time.gmtime() now raise an OSError instead
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/9ee4a104e33d

New changeset 94b7eb09d0b3 by Victor Stinner in branch 'default':
Issue bpo-13847: time.clock() now raises a RuntimeError if the processor time used
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/94b7eb09d0b3

I added tests on localtime() and clock().

I read more carefully time(), ftime() and gettimeofday() manpage: it is not possible that they fail if the argument is an invalid pointer, the current code is correct.

I don't want to backport changes because they are incompatible.

--

There is a failure on FreeBSD 8.2:

======================================================================
FAIL: test_localtime_failure (test.test_time.TimeTestCase)
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "/usr/home/buildbot/buildarea/3.x.krah-freebsd/build/Lib/test/test_time.py", line 358, in test_localtime_failure
    self.assertRaises(OSError, time.localtime, invalid_time_t)
AssertionError: OSError not raised by localtime

http://www.python.org/dev/buildbot/all/builders/AMD64%20FreeBSD%208.2%203.x/builds/1746/steps/test/logs/stdio

test_localtime_failure() should be removed or at least skipped on FreeBSD, except if someone knows another invalid time_t value on this platform.

New changeset 516d42a6e518 by Victor Stinner in branch 'default':
Issue bpo-13847: Fix test_mktime(), time.localtime() now raises OSError
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/516d42a6e518

New changeset 856f0864437a by Victor Stinner in branch 'default':
Issue bpo-13847: Make test_localtime_failure() more robust
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/856f0864437a

The issue should be done with the last commit.

There is still an error on Windows:

======================================================================
FAIL: test_localtime_failure (test.test_time.TimeTestCase)
----------------------------------------------------------------------

Traceback (most recent call last):
  File "D:\Buildslave\3.x.moore-windows\build\lib\test\test_time.py", line 364, in test_localtime_failure
    self.assertRaises(OSError, time.gmtime, invalid_time_t)
AssertionError: OSError not raised by gmtime

http://www.python.org/dev/buildbot/all/builders/x86%20XP-5%203.x/builds/4074/steps/test/logs/stdio

time.ctime() uses localtime() internally, whereas time.gmtime() doesn't. Another time should maybe be written (to test a different time_t value). Or remove completly the whole test because it is not reliable :-)

New changeset 5b42aefb8969 by Victor Stinner in branch 'default':
Issue bpo-13847: Fix test_time, time.gmtime() doesn't use localtime()
http://hg.python.org/cpython/rev/5b42aefb8969